


In the Time of the TARDIS

by HalfBakedPoet



Series: Warehouse Thirteenth [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Warehouse 13
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Angst and Humor, Crossover, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, I promise there's an explanation of Wh13 lore in chapter 2, Just Roll With It, Minor Character Death, Niche Crossover, Oh yes I'm vibin but this hurt so much, Some Fluff, Warehouse 12, Whovians this is where I convince you to watch Warehouse 13, buckle up for hurtsville beep beep, literally this is just me being self-indulgent but what are these times for anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:15:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23953687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfBakedPoet/pseuds/HalfBakedPoet
Summary: In hot pursuit of an artifact, H.G. Wells stumbles into a curious blue box with an even more curious owner. When she learns that true time travel is possible, she welcomes this stranger into Warehouse 12, unaware that wonder is more endless than she could have possibly imagined...
Relationships: Jenny Flint/Madame Vastra, Myka Bering/Helena "H. G." Wells, Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan & Graham O'Brien & Ryan Sinclair, Thirteenth Doctor/Yasmin Khan
Series: Warehouse Thirteenth [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1733086
Comments: 85
Kudos: 93





	1. Doors and Alleys

**Author's Note:**

  * For [themysteryvanishing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/themysteryvanishing/gifts).



_“Strax! Hi! Good to see you, mate, was just in the neighborhood, thought I’d pop by to say hello. Vastra and Jenny in?” The woman at the door spoke quickly as she beamed from under her hood, blonde hair dripping in the rain, which sheeted down in a torrent behind her. “Well, really, it’s a matter of some urgency, but nothing Vastra couldn’t handle. Could you let me in?”_

_“I know not who you are, strange, small woman, but you seem to be under the delusion I’ve seen you before, and I assure you my memory is a perfect specimen of Sontaran recall.” Strax bobbed as he spoke and mopped his round, pinched face with a handkerchief._

_“Oh, come off it, Strax, it’s me! You know me!” The woman’s nose rumpled as she swiped water off her eyelashes. “And who’re you calling ‘small’?”_

_“Surely, you jest, madam, for I have never met a person named ‘Me’, least of all you. Now, good day to your small self and begone, or else I must apologize, but I shall have to liquidize you for the glory of Sontar and this house.” He made a move to shut the door, but the woman shoved her boot in the jamb with a wince, shouldering into the gap._

_“You’re letting me in, old friend, I’ll answer all your questions once I’ve seen Vastra. Oi! Vastra! You home?”_

_Jenny Flint trotted down the stairs to the sight of the struggle: Strax pushing against the front door with his shoulder, the woman pushing back but slowly getting crushed._

_“What’s all the racket—Oh, for goodness’ sake, let ‘er in, Strax! I’ve told you time and again slammin’ the door on people isn’t ‘ow we deal with guests—”_

_“Jenny!” cried the woman, breaking into a watery grin as she burst past Strax, trailing puddles off her long blue coat. “How long’s it been? You alright?” She pulled Jenny close by her forearms and kissed her on the cheek, dampening her with a hug._

_Jenny tilted her head. “’Ave we met?”_

_“Oh,” said the woman, breaking apart, her eyes widening as it dawned on her. “Forgot I haven’t seen you since I was a man.”_

_Jenny’s eyes narrowed. “No…” she said, her voice wavering with disbelief._

_The woman grinned wider. “Oh, yes.”_

_“You can’t be…”_

_“I very much can.”_

“Doctor?” _Eyes newly bright, Jenny’s mouth hung open with a mixture of joy and surprise._

_“In the flesh! Just about brand new, you wouldn’t believe the time I’ve had trying to find you since I’ve landed!”_

_“What, you forget the layout of London since you changed again?”_

_“Not in the slightest! You know me, mind like a steel trap. Well. Most of the time.” The Doctor’s mouth pulled to one side._

_“So what brings you here?”_

_“Ah. That. Well…” The woman turned back to Strax, who was kneeling over another woman collapsed in the doorway. “Ran into a bit of a… what did she call it… a_ curiosity, _and I thought it might be more your bag since I can’t stay here forever. Keep an eye on things for me here while I’m off in the universe.”_

_“Of course, but ‘oo is that you’ve brought with you?”_

“Well,” _said the Doctor, stretching the word to the breaking point. “Dunno if you’ve heard this, but I’ve just met H.G. Wells, and Jenny…” The Doctor’s face sparked with delight. “H.G. Wells is a_ woman.”

Helena was not one to shy from a mystery. Rather, it was a large part of her life, unraveling mysteries and locking them away in the belly of Warehouse Twelve, or inventing them for her novels. Mysteries were not the problem. Far from it. However, when in pursuit of one such curiosity, as she and the other agents called it, she preferred her chase to be unhindered by another mystery suddenly appearing on the spot. The blue box hadn’t been present half a second ago as she turned down an alley, sprinting after a young man in possession of Sir Gawain’s Gauntlet, but then suddenly _there it was_ , with a wheezing and groaning, thudding into place as she ran headlong into it.

She fell backward and, in a daze, squinted up to see the band of black over white windows across the top border, which read in frank print: POLICE BOX, PUBLIC CALL. Helena snorted to herself. Of _course_ the police would be a hindrance; they were always getting in the way of investigation, costing both time and a fair amount of money to keep them quiet. She propped herself onto her elbows, hoping to god that Wolcott had cut off their runner on the other side of the alley.

A door creaked open, catching her attention in time to see the blonde head of another woman poke out from the side. This woman looked not the least bit police-like, no uniform, but in a pale blue, long coat, yellow bracers, a blue shirt with a muted rainbow splashed across it and—Helena lifted an eyebrow—blue trousers that showed a length of calf down to her booted ankles. The woman spotted Helena on the ground and rushed over to help.

“Oh, I am sorry,” said the stranger, pulling Helena to her feet. “Bit of a rush job, was trying to find my friends on this side of the century.” She spoke very quickly in an accent that Helena recalled as hearing somewhere near Yorkshire. “You wouldn’t happen to know what year it is, would you?”

Helena stared. “You… don’t know the year?”

“Humor me?”

“1899.”

“Good year, 1899. Will have to get changed. Might have overshot Vastra by a year…” The woman patted her pockets until she found a biscuit, which she munched thoughtfully, watching black smoke unfurl into the sky from nearby chimneys.

“Excuse me, but who are you?” asked Helena. “In my line of work, I see the most impossible things, but your box… it’s not a trick.”

The woman’s eyes brightened—a brilliant depth of hazel, Helena noted. “What’s your line of work, then? Oh, introductions. I do get ahead of myself. I’m the Doctor.” The Doctor beamed.

“Just… the Doctor?” Helena’s brow furrowed. Curiosity, indeed.

“Yep.” The Doctor beamed. “And who are you? Takes a heap of talent to run into my TARDIS like that.”

Helena straightened her waistcoat, her confused expression ingraining itself even deeper into the lines on her face. “Helena.”

“Like I said, heaps of talent, Helena…?”

“Wells.”

“Oh! That’s a good name, Helena Wells. You know, if your middle name starts with a ‘g’, you could be another H.G. We—”

“It does.”

The Doctor blinked and her eyebrows edged closer, creasing her forehead. “Come again?”

“H.G. Wells. I see no harm in telling you, since you’re not from around here; I take it from your accent and your clothes, not to mention your lack of knowledge of the year and the curious over-rapid pulse I felt on your wrist when you helped me off the ground.” Helena dusted her trousers. “Which doesn’t even begin to discuss the manner in which you arrived.”

The Doctor’s mouth opened in surprise before widening into the biggest grin yet. “Oh, she’s good. You are very good, H.G. Wells.” Her expression changed from delight to curiosity, the crease between her eyebrows returning. “Do people generally call you Helena or is H.G. all right?”

“Polite society and close friends call me Helena. My cohorts in private call me H.G.”

“Right, Helena it is. Polite and friendly. I like it.” The Doctor reached into an inner pocket of her coat and pulled out a device Helena judged to be made of steel. The device gave a whirring, buzzing noise, the crystal on its end igniting amber as the Doctor waved it over her head. She examined it closely, her nose scrunching as she squinted at it, the reading unfathomable to Helena. “Oh, this _is_ London, then. Didn’t overshoot at all. Stuck the landing. Well,” she said, glancing at the welt on Helena’s forehead. “Almost no casualties.” She pocketed the device before Helena could ask what it was. “And here we are, stumbling into the father— _mother_? Of modern science fiction! Not the _inventor_ of science fiction, though, mind… I’m chuffed, mate, really. Read all your books. Such an imagination. And all this time, you’ve been pretending to be a man! Can totally relate, until a bit ago, I was a man, now everyone expects me to be when I turn up and it’s great fun seeing the look on their faces.” Helena found her hand being shaken energetically, understanding less than half of what was said.

“If we’re through here,” said Helena as she reclaimed her arm, her curiosity whining in the back of her head, competing with the demand to complete her job.

“Are we?” asked the Doctor, her expression turning blank.

“Look, I’m flattered you’ve read my work, but I was in the middle of something and I’ll be needed on the other side of your box.”

“Ah, your… line of work. Best I don’t get in the way again. Sorry about that. It’s a shame, though, I was just about to tell you, you were right.”

Helena inclined her head. “Right?”

“About time travel. Well, it’s not quite the same as you wrote it, but the fact you came up with the idea at all, no prior encounters with a traveler to speak of… that’s brilliant, that is.”

Helena froze. Her mouth opened and closed, the dam on her grief cracking. She could feel her jaw tremble, the well of loss rising in her eyes. _Not now._ _Control it._ She composed herself too late; the Doctor noticed her shift in mood.

“Summat I said, Helena? You alright?”

Helena cleared her throat. “Fine,” she said vaguely. In truth, she hadn’t thought about time travel in a while; her explorations into Gestalt, while not quite a failure—not on the technical end, anyway—had had to be shelved. She couldn’t risk another run-in with the Regents; they’d already caught her twice.

The Doctor shoved her hands in her pockets, her face apologetic. “I should let you get on with your work. Seemed important if you had to be running that fast.” She started back toward her box, Helena’s window into time travel closing with each step. “I do know a thing or two about running. Even if you haven’t told me what it is you do for your living. Good luck, H.G. Wells…”

“No, wait,” Helena blurted. The Doctor turned back to face her, eyebrows raised. Good. She had her. Nothing for it, then. “Something tells me you’re… familiar with the unknown?”

The Doctor leaned back casually, her thumbs tucking into her bracers as she rocked onto the balls of her feet. “You could say the unknown and I get cozy from time to time. Only had it over for tea last Tuesday, Yaz was—”

“Perfect,” Helena cut in. She put on her most charming smile, the one that had lured many unwitting men into spilling their secrets, among other bodily fluids. “Might I introduce you to a world of endless wonder?”

“Already seen the universe is full of wonder, am I missing something about Earth?”

Helena’s smile faltered; there again was that speedy, annoying admission of something beyond her comprehension. She changed tack.

“Doctor... You seem well-traveled and well-informed…” In spite of her… eccentricities, thought Helena. “In all your travels, have you heard of Warehouse Twelve?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, hello!
> 
> If you're here for Doctor Who, brilliant! If you're here for Warehouse 13, also brilliant! If you're here for both, you have my whole heart with all my hopes and dreams before you. Niche crossovers are my usual projects here on Ao3 (see also: _Inscribed, Indelible_ in which I cross Gentleman Jack with Warehouse 13). Since I've been well obsessed with Doctor Who lately, it was only fitting I gave this crossover a proper stab. Hopefully, it'll be finished this weekend, but who knows where it'll go! I'm rather terrible at finishing my multi-chapters, which is why I've stuck with one shots lately (see also: my series _One Shots, Blue Box_ ).
> 
> I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I've enjoyed writing it. Smash any buttons you like, comments are a delight, and remember to be kind and wash your hands.
> 
> Cheers,  
> Jo


	2. At the B&B

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Oh yeah, forgot to mention Bering and Wells is an established thing because I'm weak for it.)

Myka and Helena crossed the lawn to the bed and breakfast, roller bags in tow. It hadn't been an easy snag, but at least acquiring Beethoven’s Second Symphony folio had only cost them a little of their hearing rather than all of it, and the effects hadn’t lasted longer than an hour or two. Myka smiled gently at Helena; their old team dynamic had finally settled back into place, and they had resumed solving puzzles and saving the day as though they had done it all their lives, with no unfortunate interruption involving guns, Yellowstone, or tridents. And Helena felt a small warmth in her chest as she returned the smile, eager for some well-earned rest tucked against the curve of Myka's body in their bed upstairs.

Pete greeted them in the doorway. “Hey, hey, hey, thought you might like to know we have some… _guests,”_ he said, jerking his head toward the living room. “It’s a British invasion or something in there, H.G., you’ll feel right at home.”

“Pete, what are you talking about? No one visits Univille, least of all from the UK. Or stays in the B&B. Besides, we always say we’re booked up,” said Myka, matter-of-factly.

“Oh, they’re not… _how you say_ … guests like that,” said Pete, scratching the back of his head. “They came in waving this little paper around, it just said ‘regent’, with the eye stamped on it and everything, but Claud said the paper read something about maintenance.”

Helena’s head whipped around. “Waving a bit of paper?”

“Yeah, really funky British lady, all rainbows and a blue trench coat. You’ve got some competition, she’s probably in the running for the title of Lady Cuckoo if you ask me.”

Helena’s eyes widened. “It can’t be…”

“Helena? You okay?” Myka laid a hand on her arm. Helena swallowed and nodded. “Pete, is there anyone else with this woman?”

“Yeah, an older guy, like a cockney Artie, couple of kids Claudia’s age. Well, I say kids, but—”

Helena didn’t wait to hear the rest. Leaving her bag by the door, she strode down the hall toward the sound of laughter she hadn’t heard in a lifetime. She burst into the room, the scene she least expected laid before her. The Doctor sat at the dining table, her booted feet improperly propped on it, while she sipped tea from a mug stamped with the Univille sign. Claudia roared with laughter from the couch, an older, white gentleman beside her, incredulous as though he didn’t understand the joke. A tall, young black man leaned against the wall opposite, and a woman of South Asian descent sat close to the Doctor, her elbows on her knees.

“Helena!” said the Doctor, setting her mug down to spread her arms above her head. “Been looking all over for you! I thought I’d left you in 1899, safe and sound to live out the rest of your happy life in all your writerly glory, but here I find you’ve somehow skipped ahead a hundred and twenty years! Didn’t think that was possible without a real time machine, but here you are, same as I left!”

“You went looking for me?”

“Course I did! When Vastra and Jenny said you’d gone, but they didn’t know where, I spent the better part of five years roaming up and down England for you. So I figured to track you down I’d have to work backwards, ended up at your grave, but the scan said human _male_ remains so I figured something had happened to you that was Warehouse-related.”

“In a manner of speaking,” muttered Helena.

“So then I thought, why not go back to Warehouse Twelve and ask around there? Should’ve done that earlier, if I’m honest, but by the time I’d got there, it was gone! Packed up and moved to America, and all the artifacts in it as well.”

“It’s been a bit of a side project of hers,” said the young woman beside her, half-apologetically.

“You say side project, I say obsession,” said the man against the wall.

“Oi! If you’d found out you’d misplaced the mother of science fiction, you’d go hunting as well!” said the Doctor.

Helena glanced at Claudia, whose mirth had evaporated into pure confusion. She waggled her head subtly at Helena as if to say _What the hell?_ Helena returned the silent question by pulling the corners of her mouth in opposite directions, a silent apology.

“So we were just telling Claudia about being picked up by the Tsuranga,” said the Doctor, “and she thought the idea of the Pting was incredibly funny, but it wasn’t funny at all! We could’ve died and there was a baby on board and everything.”

“Doctor, you’re too much.” Rising from the couch, Claudia pretended to laugh in the voice she adopted on missions before demanding answers out of her partner. And, pulling Helena aside, she growled, “H.G., what the _frak_ is going on? I haven’t heard a word of sense out of these people in hours, and I _know_ this has gotta be more than your standard British nonsense. No offense.”

“None taken. Unfortunately, she’s… always been a bit elusive to the clear mind.”

Pete and Myka had caught up, after what seemed to be an argument in the hall. Pete’s face was flushed, and Myka’s hair seemed to frizz more than usual, which was considerable. The Doctor leapt to her feet.

“And you must be Myka! Only heard loads about you. I hear you’re top notch at what you do, you’re the best of the best. Eidetic memory, that’s a rare, useful thing, eh?” The Doctor shook Myka’s hand in the same energetic, overeager fashion she’d done all those years ago in London upon meeting Helena. Myka made eye contact with Helena, a similar, questioning expression to Claudia’s. “Good to know you’re taking care of her. Time travelers are tricky people, I ought to know,” she said in Myka’s ear, just loud enough for Helena to hear.

“I didn’t know Helena had this many old friends,” said Myka, playing along. “Alive,” she added in a mutter, and Helena winced, her eyes closing involuntarily as if to block out what was happening.

“Oh! Introductions,” said the Doctor, “I’m always forgetting those. This is Ryan, Graham, and Yaz.” She pointed to her companions, first the young man, then the old, and then the woman. “And we’ve already met Pete and Claudia, and Abigail made such lovely tea. Shame you’ve no custard creams in America. Good job I brought my own.” She produced a biscuit from her pocket and dunked it in her tea, satisfied that social norms had been adequately met. Helena made eye contact next with Pete, who twirled a finger beside his ear, his mouth in an ‘o’ as though he were about to whistle.

“I’m sorry, I must have missed your name,” said Myka, professional as ever, despite her confusion.

“Oh, I forgot about me! Well done, Myka,” said the Doctor. “I’m the Doctor.”

“Doctor…?” asked Myka.

“Just the Doctor.” The Doctor smiled with her mouth closed, and an awkward silence fell.

“What are… you a doctor of?” Myka prodded, her own mouth flattening.

“Oh, this and that. Phlebotomy. Dash of horticulture. Engineering. Thought about being a veterinarian for a mo’, but found out certain alien species are even less fond of treatment than cats. That was a wild summer with Claude Bourgelat…”

Myka’s eyebrows stayed in their loft of disbelief, but she nodded along, again meeting Helena’s eyes with her signature _we’ll talk later_ look. “And how do you know Helena?”

“Oh, we go way back. Did a job at Warehouse Twelve together, didn’t we, Helena?”

“In a manner of speaking,” said Helena, avoiding looking at the way Myka mouthed _What?_ at her.

“Wait, if you did a job at Twelve with H.G. back in the day, then that makes you… at least as old as she is. Like... a hundred and forty?” Pete pretended to count on his fingers.

“Oh, you’re very kind, Pete,” said the Doctor, exchanging a smirk with Yaz. “I’m much older than that.”

“What, like two hundred?”

“Even older, but you’re getting just a touch warmer. Maybe a thousandth of a degree.” The corners of the Doctor’s eyes crinkled with amusement. “Truth is, I lost count of how old I am, probably around nine hundred and twenty-six. And that might have been three hundred or so years ago?” She grinned at Pete’s expression, which Helena could only compare to Trailer when someone pretended to throw his favorite ball. “No age jokes," said the Doctor quickly, pointing at Ryan without looking at him. Disappointed, Ryan closed his mouth as though he was about to crack one.

“You’re saying this whole time, you knew time travel was a possibility? An actual reality. And aliens are real, and there’s one _in our B &B?” _Shut up in their room for the night, Myka regarded Helena with her hands on her hips, utter disbelief on her face. The Doctor and her companions had retired to the blue box for the night, all laughing at Pete’s question of how they could all fit in there at once. (Myka had punched him when he confusedly muttered _“orgy?”_ )

“Myka, we deal with the unknown every day of our lives, are you telling me _this_ is where it gets unbelievable for you?” Helena crossed her arms.

“No, the alien, I can buy. Hell, _time travel being real_ , I can buy. But you not telling me about having experience with _both_ of those things? I’m having a little trouble keeping up, babe.”

“I honestly didn’t think she was real,” said Helena. “Just something I thought I’d dreamed up in the Bronze Sector when I thought I’d gone mad. Another woman showing up with a real time machine that could fix all my problems? Too good to be true.”

“But how does it work? You were able to send our minds back, but this…”

“Not without technology far beyond even what artifacts can do, it seems. And I did try.” Myka sat on the end of the bed with a sigh, and Helena joined her, lacing their fingers. “Are you going to tell me what you and Pete were arguing over?”

Myka sighed again, combing her free fingers through her unruly hair. “It was stupid. I told him he shouldn’t have let strangers into the B&B, given our history with strangers in the B&B he said he didn’t get any bad vibes, just weird ones. I told him weird vibes weren’t good vibes and he told me I wasn’t the boss of his vibes.”

“Sounds about right,” Helena chuckled and kissed the back of Myka’s hand, and Myka’s frustration melted.

“He even stuck out his tongue at me. But you and the Doctor. Tell me the story?” asked Myka, stroking Helena’s thumb with her own.

“With pleasure.”

“So… _that’s_ H.G. Wells?” asked Ryan. The fam had seated themselves around the kitchen table aboard the TARDIS for debrief, mugs of tea steaming and biscuits piled on a plate. “But what about that bloke in the pictures and newspapers?”

“Right, that’s what he was, a bloke,” agreed Graham.

“Is it really that hard for you to believe a woman came up with all those stories and ideas?” Yaz sounded indignant.

“No, I’m just saying facts is facts,” said Graham, “and the facts all point to H.G. Wells, the _father_ of modern science fiction, was a man.”

“Sorry to say history got it wrong, Graham,” said the Doctor. “That really is H.G. Wells, and she is very much a woman. Not that gender has much to do with any of it at all. Never really a concrete thing for me, gender.”

“So you’re saying she pretended to be a man all those years she was writing, and never took any credit for it?” asked Yaz.

“Sort of.” The Doctor took a slow sip of tea. “She told me her brother was the face at the front and she did all the things behind the scenes. Writings, inventions, the ideas, all the legwork. Pretty classic, a man getting all the credit.”

“If she didn’t use a time machine, how’d she get here?”

“That’s the part I can’t work out, Yaz. She showed me most of Warehouse Twelve, but time travel artifacts were few and far between. And nowhere near as good as the TARDIS, not by a long shot.” The Doctor frowned. “Suppose there’s something I’m missing here, some other technology they had going on.”

“What _is_ the deal with the artifacts, Doc?” asked Graham. “What is Warehouse Twelve and Thirteen?”

“So glad you asked,” said the Doctor. “Imagine if you will, there’s this extraordinary force on Earth. And through this extraordinary force, the personal effects of influential people gain certain… attributes or powers, you could say. Like, say Charles Dickens had a favorite pen—I know he did—and through the forces of the universe, some enormous energy transfer, his pen got the power to write things into being.”

“So, like magic?” asked Ryan.

“You could call it that, but I think it’s a kind of ancient alien technology. Never got to the bottom of it, it might have just been absorbed into the Earth itself and everyone on it’s got a little piece of it. Some more than others, which explains why you get things like celebrities.” The Doctor scratched her chin and her friends exchanged glances of varying degrees of concern.

“And the Warehouse?”

“A place for humans to lock all those things away, so they don’t fall into the wrong hands and cause trouble. Helena explained that there have been multiple versions of the Warehouse across history in the center of cultural influence for each era. Kind of like a TARDIS, if you ask me, always expanding to accommodate more artifacts, always gets a fresh new face.”

“But why lock them away?” Yaz asked, leaning in on her elbows.

“Every artifact has what the agents call a ‘downside,’” explained the Doctor. “Something bad happens when you use them, some worse than others. Might be a glitch in that technology I mentioned.”

“So Dickens’ pen could write things to be real, but it’d turn you into a regular Scrooge?” concluded Graham.

“Exactly, ten points for Graham!”

“But if the Warehouse has been on Earth this whole time,” said Yaz slowly, “how’d you not know it was a thing until you met Helena?”

“Another brilliant question, Yaz. Suppose I’ll have to ask her to give us a tour tomorrow, yeah? Give it a scan, see what the sonic picks up.”

“Oh my days, the wonders never cease,” said Ryan.

The Doctor beamed. “They certainly do not, Ryan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm riding a motivation wave with this one. Excited writing is the best kind! I hope I explained the Warehouse well enough to the Who crowd... Only makes sense that the collision course should generate a ton of questions among the respective fams. We'll get back into the Victorian era next chapter!


	3. Snag and Bag

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple more assumptions here: assume this is between DW s11 and s12, meaning the Doctor has not met Tesla or Mary Shelley, etc.
> 
> CW for a vague, passing suicide mention.

“Have you got apple bobbing downstairs?”

“What?”

“Was just thinking I smelled apples and didn’t want to miss out on the fun, in case it was happening. I love apple bobbing,” said the Doctor, amok in Caturanga’s office. She crossed to the mantle and picked up the small wind up clock, giving it a casual sniff as though sniffing clocks was something everyone did. “Course, the last time I went apple bobbing, I ended up ducked in a river on trial as a witch before King James! And _why_ does everything smell of fudge in this place? Nothing wrong with fudge, I mean, I love fudge, but—”

“Please,” said Helena, wresting the clock from the Doctor’s hands, “don’t touch anything.”

“Wise words from an experienced agent,” said Caturanga, entering with a bundle of files in his arms. “Agent Wells, I was getting worried. Wolcott returned with the Gauntlet and without you, and I was dearly hoping you hadn’t been turned to green ash.” Helena's balding mentor seated himself behind his desk and took a long sip of tea, smiling at them over the rim of his teacup. “And I see you’ve brought a friend. A new recruit, I hope? You know the rule of one still stands, we wouldn’t want to have to wipe any memories.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t be able to wipe my memory,” said the Doctor before Helena could respond. “Not something humans can do to _me_ , anyway. Usually goes the other way ‘round.” Caturanga’s eyebrows lifted with amusement, his eyes bright with his natural, whimsical curiosity, and Helena cleared her throat.

“Caturanga, I’d like you to meet the Doctor. We seemed to have, er, bumped into each other while I was chasing the Gauntlet with Wolcott.” Helena fiddled with her locket, worrying her lower lip as she recalled that afternoon.

The Doctor had agreed that Victorian London was not the time to be wearing short trousers such as hers, and invited Helena to wait inside her box while she got changed.

“Just be a minute,” said the Doctor, vanishing through the door.

“Are you suggesting we’ll both fit?” Helena called after her, looking over her shoulder at the bustle of the city street. Carriages clattered and passersby carried on with their respective hurrying businesses, harassed by urchins pretending to sell flowers and picking their pockets. No one seemed to look twice at the police box, and the Doctor poked her head back outside.

“Course we’ll both fit!” she said, grinning. “You’re going to love this, Helena, come on!”

And against her better nature, though not, she thought, the tightest of quarters she’d shared with a person, Helena stepped through the door into the box. Retaining the good sense to close the door behind her, she froze in her tracks at the sight before her, her mouth hanging open: Enormous crystal pillars formed a ring around a machine in the middle of a room that was utterly too large to fit inside the box she’d seen outside. Helena groped along the wall, feeling the warm metal that lined it as she edged into the space.

“This isn’t possible,” she said finally, the Doctor drinking in her expression with glee.

“Sure it is! Oh, that reaction never gets old. Didn’t you say you have experience with impossible?”

“This isn’t an ordinary box,” whispered Helena, gingerly stepping away from the door, deeper into the room.

“Spot on with that one, Helena,” said the Doctor, fondly stroking a panel of machinery. “This is my TARDIS.”

“Your what?”

“My TARDIS,” repeated the Doctor, as though she were speaking plain English. “Stands for Time and Relative Dimension in Space. Strictly speaking, we’re _in_ a relative dimension in space, which is why it’s—”

“Bigger on the inside,” Helena murmured.

“Exactly! Touch of dimensional engineering, a bit beyond what you humans could manufacture. Probably take you another few thousand years or so before you could have your own tech developed for time travel, but you’ll get there in the end.”

“This is a time machine?” Helena touched one of the crystal pillars, which also felt warm, pulsing with amber light.

“And a spaceship,” said the Doctor happily. She pointed her metal device at the machine and there was a click, a biscuit popping into the air from a dispenser on one side. The Doctor caught it and offered it to Helena. “Biscuit while you wait?”

“No, thank you,” said Helena, still gawping at the tech.

“I understand this is probably a lot to take in,” said the Doctor, cramming the biscuit into Helena’s hand anyway, and Helena noted vaguely that the Doctor’s fingertips were calloused like her own. “But, probably best you take the biscuit anyway. Settle your stomach, nothing a custard cream can’t fix.”

“Thanks,” said Helena blankly. Her empty hand drifted to the center console, and there was a sudden, sharp noise as the Doctor swatted it. “What was that for?” cried Helena, recoiling.

“Sorry, but I’ll have to ask you not to touch,” said the Doctor. “Delicate calibrations, she wouldn’t be happy if they got mucked up.”

“She?”

“Oh, yes,” said the Doctor, ducking into an archway that seemed to lead even further into the TARDIS. There was the sound of a door opening and the rustle of fabric. “She’s a brilliant old ghost monument, aren’t you, love?” And Helena could’ve sworn she heard a resonant hum respond, the towering central crystal flickering brighter for a heartbeat. The Doctor returned not seconds later in what were essentially the same trousers but longer, and a dark blue waistcoat embroidered with a pattern of pink and gold flowers.

“Are you seriously going out in that?” Helena couldn’t help asking pointedly. She bit her tongue as she realized how hypocritical she must sound, in her own trousers and waistcoat, so she pulled out her pocket watch and pretended to examine it.

“Yep,” said the Doctor happily. “Where are we headed, then? Warehouse Twelve, you said? Where in London might that be?” She strode past Helena and started turning a crank on one panel of the console, dashing to the other side to flip switches and press buttons. “Ah, wait, no need to tell me. Here,” she said, slapping Helena’s hand onto a circular platform. “Hold that there, if you please, Helena, and think about your Warehouse. Or better yet, think of the street _outside_ it. We’ll park around the corner.”

“What?” But the Doctor had pulled a final, large lever, and the machine hummed to life, wheezing and groaning the same way as it had appeared.

Caturanga tilted his head. “Doctor? Just Doctor?”

“I could ask you the same thing, Caturanga, just Caturanga,” said the Doctor, waggling her head with cheek. There was a pause, Helena in utter shock as the energy between the Doctor and Caturanga sparked and crackled, some unknown, silent duel raging between them in their eyes.

But then, Caturanga laughed heartily. “Oh, she’s good! A spectacular find, Wells, I see why you brought her! You and I should sit down for a game of chess sometime,” he said, wiping his eyes.

“Gladly,” beamed the Doctor, “but I’m warning you, I’ve had a few hundred years’ practice.”

Caturanga laughed harder. “It will be a glorious match to behold. Allow me to give the formalities: Welcome to Warehouse Twelve, Doctor.” From his seat, he bowed a little over his desk.

“Thank you kindly,” said the Doctor, tucking her hands in her pockets. She rocked onto her heels. “If you don’t mind my asking, what _is_ Warehouse Twelve? I’ve been all over Earth, but I’ve never heard of such a place. Means you’ve proper hidden it if I haven’t got wind in all my travels.”

“That’s wonderful to hear,” said Caturanga. He adjusted a paper on his desk into precise alignment with the grain of the wood. “It means we’ve done our job well. I’m sure you’ll find many wondrous things in the Warehouse, Doctor, but I’ll allow Helena here to give you the tour and fuller explanations. It’s probably high time you took on an apprentice, anyway, Helena,” he said, giving Helena a fatherly glance over his spectacles. “Keep you out of mischief, showing someone the ropes?”

“Of course,” said Helena stiffly. Caturanga had been instrumental in handling the regents’ ire for her… mistakes. Her mentor was only too willing to give her a second chance, and a third, though she tried to force away the thought of how their chess matches had gotten quieter, their silences less companionable and more contemplative, as though Caturanga were constantly getting the measure of her and questioning his decision to fight her being thrown out of the Warehouse altogether, or worse. “Come on,” she said, taking the Doctor by the elbow to the Warehouse floor.

“So you’re saying that objects on Earth get these powers and you lot lock them away here?” Helena had had to snatch artifact after artifact out of the Doctor’s hands, placing them delicately back on their respective shelves as they walked along the aisles.

“That,” she said, yanking another trinket from the Doctor’s fingers, “is Harriet Tubman’s thimble, and yes, we have to lock it all away.”

“Why is that, though?” The Doctor had sidled up to yet another stack, her instrument in hand, whirring along as she scanned the artifacts on the shelf there. “Seems a lot of good can come out of…” She read the inventory card. “Abulcalsis’ catgut suture kit, stitches wounds closed on its own and accelerates healing? Oh, that’s brilliant, I met Abulcalsis way back when. Took care of that poor girl who’d slashed her own throat.” Helena stared. “She was a slave,” said the Doctor, as though that explained everything. “He was a good doctor, she healed perfectly and everything. Well. Almost perfectly, as much as you could in those days. Come to think of it, I recognize this needle…” It was Helena’s turn to swat the Doctor’s hand. “Oi!”

“If I don’t get to touch your time machine, you don’t get to handle the artifacts,” warned Helena, and the Doctor scowled like a child. “Trust me, there is a lot of bad that can come out of these things as well. Best to keep them all hidden, but for certain special circumstances.”

“H.G.,” came Wolcott’s breathless voice from two shelves away, and both their heads turned toward it. Between the slats, Helena spotted him wandering back and forth, artifact wrapped in a cloth so as to avoid touch. “Is that you? I’m having the most difficult time finding room for this Gauntlet, could you lend a hand?”

“Oh, H.G., I do like the sound of that as well,” said the Doctor, brightening. “I’ll just use it interchangeably going forward, yeah?”

“Fine,” said Helena, pulling the Doctor behind her by her coat sleeve. “Stay close.”

“Where were you off to while I nabbed this one?” asked Wolcott, thrusting the wrapped Gauntlet into Helena’s hands.

“Sorry, Wolly, I seem to have run into… well,” she said, not wanting to admit her moment of clumsiness, least of all to Wolcott. “This is the Doctor. Doctor, William Wolcott, my partner in hunting curiosities.”

“How do you do?” asked Wolcott, offering his hand to the Doctor.

“Does everyone call you Wolly?” asked the Doctor, shaking it, though not as excitedly as she had Helena’s.

“No, just… H.G.,” muttered Wolcott, turning pink. “Are you a new recruit, then?”

“You could say that! Never heard of Warehouse Twelve in all my lifetimes, and I’ve been all over!”

“All your…” started Wolcott, but Helena cleared her throat, scanning the shelves for a vacancy.

“Looks like we’ll find a proper place for this in the medieval section,” said Helena, desperate for some sense of normalcy. “Doctor, I’d like to show you some standard protocol and equipment once we’ve stored this.”

“Right you are, H.G. Wells, let’s get a shift on.” And the Doctor started a path deeper into the Warehouse, without the faintest clue where she was going. Helena seized the hood of her coat to prevent her from wandering off.

“Doctor, it’s this way,” she said, jerking her head in the opposite direction.

Life in Warehouse Twelve had never been more unusual, or interesting, thought Helena a week later, arriving to the front office to find the Doctor and Caturanga locked in yet another intense chess match by the fire. And that was given the fact that life in the Warehouse was _always_ unusual and interesting, often to the point that she and Wolcott had agreed they’d like just _one week_ in which a curiosity didn’t involve covering them with soot, bile, or any other substance, or the appearance of countless ferrets from a kettle. The Doctor took to this life with her own brand of eager delight, poring over every artifact she’d been assigned to shelve as if she’d seen it before; handling them all like a child with a toy, as though she weren’t afraid of the negative effects. In truth, she didn’t seem to be afraid of much at all, least of all the artifacts. Always, she gave them a scan with her device—she’d told Helena it was a sonic screwdriver—reading it with a mixture of fascination and consternation, as though she hadn’t found she answer she was seeking, but what she found was just as interesting. And never once did an artifact give her the trouble it had given any of the other agents; if Helena didn’t know better, she’d say the artifacts might have been afraid of the Doctor instead of the other way around, as it should have been. But for the life of her, Helena couldn’t understand how such an eccentric could be so dangerous that even Dark Vault artifacts refused to work against her.

The Doctor had bluntly refused proper firearms training, but appreciated the elegant, nonlethal shock of the Tesla gun, and had already made her own modifications to the standard issue given to her, tinkering with her sonic, and she now claimed that her Tesla could make perfect toast, as well as a number of other features both useful and arbitrary. She had also been properly impressed when Helena mentioned meeting Nikola Tesla himself all those years ago, bringing him into the fold of the Warehouse, where he could invent freely, his brilliant mind finally given the exercise it so craved as he modified Caturanga’s prototype into a more elegant design. When Helena showed the Doctor her private workshop under the main Warehouse floor, the Doctor ran from invention to invention, exclaiming with delight that each one was brilliant, and offering impossible solutions to the quandaries that prevented many of them from working as Helena had imagined.

“Anti-matter’d be enough juice to get your Imperceptor Vest going, H.G., but it’s at least a hundred years before that’s discovered and cultivated on Earth…”

And every night, as the agents departed and shut down operations, the Doctor retired to her TARDIS, not at all tired, whistling as though she’d just had a merry romp. The time machine always nagging at the back of her mind, Helena observed her new “apprentice” with a mixture of envy and joyful wonder, though she had to question sometimes who really was the teacher and who was the student in their affairs.

Admittedly, though, it was satisfying to see Caturanga lose at chess so often—which pleased both players—and the rare times he didn’t lose to the Doctor, the game ended in a stalemate—which also pleased both players. Caturanga wasn’t accustomed to such a challenge, and he took after it with a near-obsessive zeal, spending his free time in the library studying advanced chess techniques.

“I have you, Doctor,” said Caturanga, sliding his bishop across the board in part of a gambit Helena recognized as his own invention, which had caused her a spectacular loss not three months prior.

“Have you?” asked the Doctor, sweeping in with a knight, allowing her queen into a pin, rather than taking the bishop.

“Oh, I’m sure this time,” said Caturanga, taking the knight.

“Check,” said the Doctor, flourishing her queenside knight.

“How do you do that?” chuckled Caturanga, edging his king out of the way.

“And that’s mate, mate,” said the Doctor, capturing the bishop with her queen. She flicked the black marble king over and offered a handshake. “Brilliant effort this time, though, Caturanga, you did almost have me there.”

“I’m not sure your definition of ‘almost had you’ matches mine,” said Caturanga, taking the offer of sportsmanship. “Helena, _where_ on Earth did you say you found her? Agent Wells is one of the brightest minds of this decade and even she hasn’t yet defeated me, but here you have a running tally of eighteen games on me and I’ve but to scratch your hide!” They tapped their teacups against each other, grinning with that competitive spark only geniuses could share.

“I’m not convinced she’s _from_ Earth,” Helena muttered, catching the way the Doctor winked at her before she answered. “In an alley, I just… stumbled into her,” she said. “That being said, we have a curiosity to chase.”

“Spectacular,” said Caturanga, rising from his armchair. “Your first field mission, Doctor! Sad to see your Warehouse-stationed training with inventory and protocol come to so soon of a conclusion, but all birds must eventually fly the nest. Good luck,” he said with a smile.

“Where we off to, then?” asked the Doctor, trotting beside Helena with excessive energy. “And should we take the TARDIS? Mind, we could go back a tick and nab the artifact _before_ it causes any trouble. What are we looking for again?” As always, she spoke so quickly, it nearly made Helena’s head spin. Helena forced away the thought that the Doctor asked nearly as many questions as Christina, though her daughter hadn’t had the air of already knowing the answers to what she asked.

“We ought to riddle out what we’re tracking first,” said Helena mildly, stopping to nod at a bobby whom she’d paid to stand guard at a corner by the imprint of a body that had vanished just that morning. She crouched beside the remains, a dusty substance, but not ash, and scooped a pinch of it into a vial of fluid she produced from a pocket. The buzz of the sonic screwdriver was about to drive her mad, Helena thought, as the Doctor, after licking a fingerful of the substance, made her own observations.

“That’s not just dust,” said the Doctor, her eyes widening as she read the scan with a combination of horror and intense fascination. “That’s a complete set of human remains. Absolutely dehydrated and crushed into powder. Look, you can even see the outline of organs once you look past the skin cells.”

Helena’s lips parted as she comprehended what the Doctor said, her mind racing to catch up and also to untangle how what she claimed was a _screwdriver_ could tell her that much. But she squinted again at the human outline and agreed, there were slightly darker patches in the shapes of what she could trace as a heart, lungs, stomach, and liver.

“I’ll take that,” said the Doctor, snatching the vial from Helena’s fingers, dashing off in the direction of her TARDIS. “Come on, we can track it down with this, telepathic circuit will get a fix on it…”

“How did it go?” asked Caturanga later that evening, steepling his fingers over his nightcap brandy.

“Well, as you can see, we bagged the artifact,” said Helena ruefully, casting a glance at the cloth parcel on the desk between them. She sipped her wine with a pained expression.

“But?” Caturanga nudged. “I sense you’re unsettled by this. Is the Doctor not a natural apprentice?”

“She is; she has a way with the artifacts the likes we’ve never seen before, but her methods may be a bit… unorthodox,” she said, turning her locket in her palm.

“How so?” asked Caturanga, leaning in. “Were there any casualties?”

“Just the one fellow we were too late to save, but that’s just it, this should have been a difficult case, it was almost too easy,” said Helena, frowning.

A chunk of lapis lazuli suspected to have belonged to an unnamed, ousted priest of Anubis who had been buried with it in the Egyptian desert some four thousand years ago, which could not only mummify a person alive, but also dehydrate them into powder on the spot _should have been_ a difficult case, one that potentially took months to complete. But the Doctor, with her seemingly magical box, had swept in to the exact location of the artifact, spooking the handler into giving it over without a fight, all the while scolding the artifact like a pet that had misbehaved.

“Now you,” she said, without even wearing gloves as she picked up the stone, her nose rumpling in its usual way as she examined it closely, waving her sonic screwdriver over it. “That’s enough out of you, look at the mess you’ve created here! Some poor bloke’s just dust and smithereens, and you’re not even sorry about it. You’re gonna have to come with us, mate.” She tucked the stone into a pocket of her coat, which Helena noted shouldn’t have been able to fit, nor did it seem to cause any imbalance in the way the Doctor wore it.

“Excellent help you were, Helena,” said the Doctor sincerely, milling about the TARDIS controls as Helena watched, taking mental notes. “Good job collaring that fellow who’d been using the stone and turning him in, I’m still a bit socially awkward and wouldn’t know how to do these things properly.”

“You didn’t seem to need much help,” said Helena conversationally, eyeing the way the Doctor turned a dial lovingly, the smart way she flipped a particular switch and how many degrees the crank turned before she pulled the final lever that sent them back across London. Perhaps it was enough observation to start a calculation of her own. Helena fiddled with her locket, rubbing her thumb over the cover, her mind ablaze.

Not for the first time, the Doctor noticed Helena’s darkening. “You alright? I’d say it was a smashing success, wouldn’t you?”

“You’re a natural at this,” said Helena, putting her guard back up. “The TARDIS is certainly an asset to our work.”

“Oh, she’s brilliant,” said the Doctor fondly. “Forwards and backwards in time, anywhere you like in the universe, so long as you treat her right.” She patted one of the monitors, and a small chime Helena could only describe as matching in fondness echoed in the control room.

“Doctor…” said Helena, chewing her lip thoughtfully. “If it can indeed go backwards in time, do you think you could have saved that poor fellow the artifact killed?”

The Doctor’s smile faltered. “She can do lots of things, Helena, but she can’t do that.” It sounded like a warning and a gentle admission in one. The Doctor nodded at her, changing the subject. “You keep playing with that locket of yours, is someone on your mind?”

Helena’s mouth flattened and she gripped the locket tighter. “My daughter,” she said, finally circumventing the lump in her throat.

“Oh, is she away at school? You’re a busy mother, aren’t you, looking after the Warehouse as well!”

“No, she…” Helena started, swallowing. Two failed attempts at time travel to bring her back, and here was the solution before her. If she could only riddle out how to work the damn thing. In her mind, her fist curled around the fledgling calculations and observations she’d made over the handful of times she'd seen the Doctor pilot the blue box, just as it curled around her locket and Christina in it. Helena cleared her throat. “She died earlier this year,” she said briskly, pain rubbed freshly raw.

The Doctor tilted her head; her face creasing with that sickeningly kind concern, the kind Helena wished everyone would stop directing at her. “And you’re alright, back at work like nothing happened? Taking me on as an apprentice and everything?”

“It helps,” Helena explained shortly. “To have something diverting to do.” It wasn’t a lie.

The Doctor inclined her head like she understood, her eyes soft and faraway, though they trained on Helena with a fathomless depth of empathy. “I’m sorry. Losing a child is unimaginable, until it happens. Then it's all you can imagine.”

Helena looked away, her mind in a frantic whirl of possibility, and the TARDIS landed outside Warehouse Twelve with a thud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, hello!
> 
> I am in a state of utter rapture writing this fic, y'all. Both universes are veritable PLAYGROUNDS and mushing them together into this big ball of possibilities is such a delight. Whovians, this is your excuse for getting into Warehouse 13, which I understand is a niche fandom to begin with, even in American nerdery circles.
> 
> As always, remember to be kind to yourselves and others. Guest or user, smash any buttons you like. I love reading your comments, especially since they're confirming for me that this crossover wasn't just something I alone wanted!
> 
> Cheers,  
> Jo


	4. To the Warehouse

“Will the regents even allow this?” Myka asked, and Artie’s bushy eyebrows furrowed. Helena squeezed her hand, unable to prevent the guilt rising in her eyes, and she looked at the floor, which seemed much more appealing than Artie’s ire.

“She says she knows H.G. from their days at Warehouse Twelve. They showed up in what she _claims_ is a time machine, which very well could just be another artifact to snag, and they already seem to know secrets. We’re bending the rule of one, but I’ll let the regents know we’ve had another… curious run-in.” He scratched his chin. “…I might redact a little bit. This is beyond what even Mrs. Frederic could explain.” He pointed at Helena. “They’re your responsibility if anything goes wrong,” he growled. “I’m not sticking my neck out for a gang of irresponsible Brits, no matter how good they were at bagging artifacts in Victorian London.”

“Not for the first time,” said Helena airily, and Artie headed toward his car, Trailer at his heels. Helena and Myka exchanged an awkward glance.

“So…” said Myka, looking at the TARDIS, which was parked in the backyard as though it had always been there. “That’s the time machine?”

“Doesn’t look like much on the outside, but it is,” said Helena.

“And you said it’s…”

“Bigger on the inside, yeah.”

“That can’t be possible.”

“Strictly speaking, _nothing’s_ impossible, is it? We’ve just proved that.”

“I suppose not.” Myka had listened to Helena’s story with great interest, only pausing their conversation the night prior to select a Twizzler from the box on the nightstand, which she chewed thoughtfully through the parts about the Doctor’s training in Warehouse Twelve. They watched Pete dog the Doctor’s heels across the lawn.

“So this is your spaceship?” Pete hugged himself, trying to contain his boyish glee.

“Yep,” said the Doctor, listening to the TARDIS through her stethoscope. Something had sounded off about the timeline calibration matrix before they’d landed in what she took a moment to remember was South Dakota. Middle of nowhere, smart place to hide a Warehouse full of dangerous objects. She could hear the TARDIS’ heartbeat after a fashion; a slight rhythmic irregularity in the usual thrum of energy. There seemed to be something stuck in that matrix, probably a loose part she’d have to pull free. Nothing major, just a screw or bolt. A loose wire that could fry the entire system.

“Can I… see inside?” Pete’s muscular shoulders shrugged upward as he made his best convincing expression, squinting casually like he wasn’t asking.

“Nope,” said the Doctor, not looking at him as she repositioned the stethoscope. “At least, not until we’ve had a look ‘round your Warehouse, make sure there isn’t anything there that shouldn’t be.”

“Doc, I don’t know how to tell you this,” started Pete, stuffing his hands in his jean pockets.

“But you do,” said the Doctor, stowing the stethoscope. “Doc” sounded slightly perverse in an American accent, especially since Graham was the only one who used the nickname in the fam. Repairs would have to wait until the agents weren’t nosing about. _Sorry, love._

“…But _everything_ in the Warehouse isn’t really supposed to be there. Stuff’s got some wicked mojo like you’ve never seen before, no offense, you do seem well-traveled.”

The Doctor regarded him coolly. “Is this what you call mansplaining?” she asked, her nose wrinkling with genuine curiosity. “Because. I thought I’d already explained to you I’d worked with Helena prior at Warehouse Twelve and I know what artifacts are and what they do. Bagged a few in my day.” She tilted her head and Pete opened and closed his mouth like a fish. “Which doesn’t mention that I’ve seen more than you could possibly imagine. No offense,” she added, finishing with her most charming grin.

Myka smirked as she and Helena arrived to meet them. “She got you good, Pete,” she said, stifling a laugh.

An hour later, they had reached an agreement: Helena would accompany the Doctor, Graham, and Ryan in the TARDIS to the Warehouse, while Yaz would ride in the car with Pete, Myka, and Claudia. Steve and Artie were already waiting for them, and would facilitate a short tour, after which the Doctor would let the agents see inside the TARDIS.

“Why do I get the feeling you’re pulling the wool over our eyes,” said Pete, turning the steering wheel down the bed and breakfast drive. “It can’t possibly be a spaceship as great as all that.”

“Sounds like someone’s got sour grapes,” Myka ribbed.

“I know it sounds crazy and you probably don’t believe me,” said Yaz, nodding from the backseat, “but we’re definitely not lying.”

“That makes me feel a ton better, thanks, Yaz,” said Pete sarcastically, and Myka swatted his arm. “Hey! Driving!”

“I gotta say, I’m with Pete on this one,” said Claudia, looking at Yaz sideways, half apologetically. “No proof the box works, aside from your appearance on our doorstep. But people show up all the time unannounced like that.”

“You’ll see,” said Yaz, giving her best air of confidence.

“So how’d you get mixed up with Lady Cuckoo _numero dos?_ ” asked Pete, peering at Yaz through sunglasses in the rearview mirror.

“She fell into a train I was investigating,” said Yaz, smiling at the memory. “There was this alien invasion in Sheffield, where I’m from, I was a police officer—”

“Whoa, hit the brakes a second,” said Claudia, turning to face Yaz fully. “Not you, Pete. You’re saying aliens are real? Like. Little green men on Mars and Naruto running into Area Fifty-One real?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say little green Martians, but yeah. I’ve seen ‘em. And so have you, now you’ve met the Doctor.”

“There’s no way some eccentric British lady obsessed with a box is an alien,” scoffed Pete. "And why are aliens so interested in the UK, Scully? What have you got going on there that's worth invading anyway?"

“And you have lots of experience with aliens, do you, mate?” retorted Yaz. Myka snorted quietly. “Aliens aren’t what you expect, a lot of them look us. Met this Gifftan who looked just like a human male but he was pregnant. Beautiful baby boy, though, he named him Avocado.”

“That’s… a lot to unpack,” said Claudia slowly. Silence fell over the car, but for the rumble of the road under them.

“You were saying about the train,” said Myka finally. “You were a police officer before?”

“Yeah, still am, sort of. We’ll need to stop making excuses for my absences eventually, but I love the work too much to quit all the way.”

“Seems almost boring, if what you’re telling us about your travels is true,” said Claudia.

“What did you lot do before the Warehouse, then?” asked Yaz. “How does one get to be an agent?”

“It’s…” started Myka.

“…kind of a long story,” said Pete.

“Not for me, I hacked in and you pretty much adopted me.” Claudia rested her head against her hands, reclining into her seat with her eyes closed. "Knock, knock," she said with a smirk, though she made it sound more like an inside joke.

“We were Secret Service before,” finished Myka. “Pete ran into Artie on a job, we tangled with an artifact, and Mrs. Frederic recruited us.”

“You were less than enthusiastic about the reassignment, weren’t you, Mykes?” Pete flicked the turn signal.

“Well, I got a pet out of it,” said Myka. “And a ferret.”

“Oh, ha ha…”

“Mrs. Frederic?” asked Yaz.

Pete and Myka spoke at the same time.

“That’s classified,” said Pete.

“She’s the caretaker,” said Myka. They glared at each other, and Yaz sensed a sibling-like rivalry as Pete turned his attention back to the road.

“She basically owns the Warehouse,” finished Claudia, not amused by the silent argument, which Yaz could infer was a regular occurrence.

“How do you like... traveling with the Doctor?” asked Myka, dutifully keeping the conversation rolling, if only to avoid more awkward silence.

“Oh, it’s mad and it’s scary sometimes. But loads of fun,” said Yaz, watching the South Dakota plains roll by. “We get to see new planets all the time, meet new people. The Doctor might seem… strange, but she’s the best person out there, I promise. “

“Sounds like you like her.” Pete raised the pitch of his voice, and Myka swatted him again.

Yaz paled somewhat, her own expression blank. “Well… of course I like her. Only have to travel with her for weeks on end. Graham and Ryan as well. It’s just like we say, we’re a family.”

“Sounds familiar,” said Myka, smiling back at Yaz through the mirror. Yaz blushed and thanked the stars that the ride was over as Pete pulled up to the Warehouse.

“When should we meet them?” asked the Doctor, leaning against the TARDIS door as the SUV pulled away.

“Give them about fifteen, twenty minutes,” said Helena. “Traffic,” she said smoothly, half a joke.

“So we’re clear, I haven’t forgotten what you did,” said the Doctor abruptly. So there was the impossibly large elephant that the Doctor had managed to hide under a sheet in the corner. And true to style, she flourished the sheet as she whisked it away. “Even if I understand why. Still contemplating if I should let you into the TARDIS again or if I should just leave you behind to drive yourself.”

“How would you get there without me?” asked Helena, more of a statement than a question.

“Yaz’s phone,” said the Doctor with a hint of smugness, cracking her knuckles impressively. Helena feigned impassivity. “She’s got a bit of micro-tracking on her, just a safety precaution.”

“Then why insist I stay behind with you?”

“I have my reasons,” said the Doctor. “Call it playing catch up with an old teacher.”

“Shall we go, then?” asked Graham, arriving with Ryan, snapping the tension in two, and the Doctor was all smiles again.

“Just have to wait a bit longer, we want to put on a bit of a show. Give them time to get there first.” She held the door open for them. “D’you mind nipping to the kitchen to put the kettle on? Seems we might have time for a cuppa before we go.”

“Sure,” said Ryan, heading inside. Graham stood with his hands in his jacket pockets, putting on a vague smile for Helena.

“Graham,” said the Doctor. “Think it might be a two-man job.” She jerked her head toward the TARDIS interior, and Graham caught on.

“You got it, Doc, I’ll just make sure Ryan doesn’t blow up the kitchen…” He disappeared inside. Helena made a move to follow him, but the Doctor placed her arm across the opening, palming the opposite edge of the doorframe. Helena lifted her eyebrows, unsurprised.

“Touch. Nothing,” said the Doctor, a warning gleam in her eye.

“Not even the biscuit dispenser?” said Helena, half amused.

The corners of the Doctor’s mouth pulled in opposite directions and she relented. “All right, you can touch that, but nothing else,” she said, if a little grumpily, and released her hold on the door. She followed Helena inside, almost catlike in the way she stalked her every move. “Something I haven’t worked out, Helena,” she said, watching her politely keep her hands behind her back as she looked around in wonder at the familiar sight of the control room, “is how you managed travel a century forwards on your own, with no time machine or time travel device to speak of.”

“There was no time travel, not like you’re thinking,” said Helena, meeting the Doctor’s narrowed eyes calmly. “And I didn’t do it alone.”

The Doctor fiddled with a switch on the console, tuning it up and down with her fingertip. “What was it, then? Rather a neat trick, staying the same physical age over a hundred years. I’d almost hazard there was an artifact involved. Or something alien.”

“It was an artifact, in a manner of speaking.” Helena helped herself to a custard cream. The crisp vanilla shortbread was a comfort, and she leaned against a pillar to finish it.

“What was it, then? You said you showed me everything in Warehouse Twelve, what am I missing?”

“I lied.”

“Course,” scoffed the Doctor.

“Not the way you’re thinking,” said Helena quickly. “In those days, the Bronze Sector was a little more high-level than an apprentice’s access.”

“The Bronze Sector?”

Helena regarded the Doctor, her eyelids lowered somewhat. “Do I have to spell it out for you?”

The Doctor’s face screwed up on one side, for once, her brain working to catch up. And in an instant, it dawned on her, the crinkles around her eyes and mouth smoothing as she said, “You were put in stasis.”

“If that’s what you call it. We say I was bronzed. Preserved for a hundred years, until some foolhardy ex-agent with a master plan let me out.” Helena fingered her locket.

Curiosity won over the suspicion on the Doctor’s face. “But why? You hadn’t done anything to endanger the Warehouse directly. Well, the Warehouse is a part of the universe, but—”

“It was my request.”

“You _asked_ to be bronzed?”

“You remember what happened, Doctor. I couldn’t be trusted in the world. I hoped I’d emerge in the future to something better, and for a time, I thought it was worse.”

“But you changed. Somewhere in all that time, you changed, didn’t you?” The Doctor tilted her head the opposite direction. “It was Myka, wasn’t it?”

“She was… better to me than I deserved. We make a great team,” Helena admitted.

“Are you happy?”

“I—”

“Um, H.G. Wells?” interrupted Ryan from the archway to the hall, a little breathless. “Graham wanted to know how you take your tea.”

Yaz stepped out onto the mostly empty lot, the sun beating down on the flat land. An enormous metal structure loomed overhead, a bit worse for wear, she thought, spotting the creeping rust along the siding and supports. She squinted up, the sheer height of the Warehouse making it difficult to see the top without making her eyes water.

“Artie, spare her the FISH, she’s not a new agent,” said Claudia exasperatedly to the stocky man approaching on a Segway.

If Yaz didn’t travel with the Doctor, she’d say Artie was one of the more eccentrically dressed people she’d ever met, in a woven hat and too small sunglasses, fingerless gloves and an extra jacket, even though it was the middle of summer. He carried a long, rod-like device, which Yaz thought was for metal detection, but she couldn’t be sure.

“What? The FISH needed fixing,” said Artie, lowering his shades. He turned to Yaz, and she got the impression he may have been a little surly, but his eyes, though sharp, were kind. “You must be Yasmin Khan. Artie Nielsen, I run this circus. I see you’ve met most of my monkeys.” They shook hands.

“Who are you calling monkeys?” protested Pete.

“And in front of company, Artie,” complained Claudia.

“You, and I expect you to behave,” said Artie, thrusting the metal detector at her. “Now, be a good monkey and take this inside.”

“Wait,” said Yaz, starting to grin as she felt the wind stir in the distinctive way she recognized. “You don’t want to miss this bit.”

And with her favorite sound in the universe, that wheezing rush that whispered adventure across constellations, the TARDIS materialized in the lot beside the SUV, kicking up dust so the agents covered their eyes. The Doctor poked her head out from the door, beaming as she spotted Yaz.

“Yaz! Glad to see you’ve arrived safe and sound, just be a moment,” she said turning back into the box to allow Graham, Ryan, and Helena outside. With no small amount of satisfaction, Yaz watched the Warehouse agents’ faces melt into various stages of disbelief: Claudia’s jaw was hanging and Pete’s eyebrows couldn’t have risen higher if he tried. Myka’s eyes were bright with curiosity, but she seemed impressed in a muted sense, and Yaz suspected Helena must have told her about the TARDIS in more detail. Artie, however, seemed unimpressed, and crossed his arms as he watched the occupants file out.

“You were saying _we’re_ a circus, Artie, but she’s got the clown car,” said Pete quietly when the Doctor emerged last, careful to hide the interior from view as she locked the door behind her. She caught Yaz by the forearms and, beaming to find her in one piece, turned her attention to the building before her.

“Is this the new Warehouse, then?” asked the Doctor, sidling up to Helena, who had resumed her place at Myka’s side. “Gone a bit to seed, hasn’t it? It really was a well-hidden sight in London back in 1899.”

“Don’t insult my Warehouse,” said Artie curtly. “I take it you’re the Doctor I’ve heard so much about. Nice magic trick, did an artifact teach it to you?”

“Excellent eyebrows, did you grow them with one?” retorted the Doctor brightly, taking Artie’s hand. “And that’s Ryan and Graham over there, I think Graham might take an interest in your contouring.”

“She’s got jokes,” Artie grumbled. Claudia sniggered behind her hand and he heaved a sigh. “After much deliberation with the regents, we found a short, redacted file on you in the Warehouse Twelve records, and since they’ve seen some stranger things in their lifetimes, they’re willing to let you and your friends in, provided,” he paused, his eyes flicking to the TARDIS, “you keep the secret and give us a look at your…”

“TARDIS.”

“What? Are you saying it’s slow?”

The Doctor opened her mouth in offense. “No, her _name_ is the TARDIS. I’ve told your team, Time and Relative Dimension in Space. Not an artifact, but she’s a spaceship and a timeship, and she goes all over the universe.”

“If you say so,” said Artie with a shrug. “That remains to be seen. Follow us. And don't touch the bombs.” He pressed a button from his pocket, and the front door opened with a clunk and a cheery beep.

“I don’t think he likes me,” said the Doctor in a low voice to Yaz, and arm-in-arm, they followed the bob of the metal detector over Claudia’s shoulder through the door.

“What’re all the bombs for?” asked Ryan from the back of the line as they walked through the white tunnel toward a door on the other end.

“Welcome to the Umbilicus,” said Claudia. “The bombs are just a precaution, in case we have to lock down.”

“Rather tighter security these days,” the Doctor muttered over her shoulder at Helena, who nodded assent.

“Can’t be too careful,” she said.

“No, I suppose not,” said the Doctor, frowning. She pulled Yaz a little closer, away from the tubes of explosives lining the Umbilicus.

Another cheery beep, and the door at the end of the tunnel opened to reveal an office space littered with papers and lined with bookshelves and filing cabinets and a map of the floor. A computer with dual monitors flitted different images across it, surveillance from various parts of the Warehouse, more maps, different artifacts and their details. The Doctor sprinted past the desk to the window, peering through the slats at the floor below.

“Oh! It’s got bigger in the last hundred years, hasn’t it? And there’s a zeppelin like the ones we got for your birthday, Yaz!” she cried. “And a zip line! That’s clever; can we give it a go? I love a zip line.” The Doctor turned back to face them, buzzing with her infectious verve, and Yaz couldn’t help smiling back.

“It’s easier to see from the bridge,” said Myka, amused as she opened the next door. They filed onto the landing, and it was the fam’s turn to gape at the rows and rows of shelves, the distant pyramid and windmill, the stacks and crates that seemed to go on forever.

“Team… _TARDIS,”_ said Artie begrudgingly, “Welcome to Warehouse Thirteen.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I realized I won't rest until this is finished. Have another chapter, smash any buttons you like.


	5. Flight of the TARDIS

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for death, not a _major_ character.  
> This chapter is why I tagged this "buckle up for hurtsville beep beep".

_“…A warehouse full of supernatural artifacts in the middle of underground London? Sounds almost too far-fetched to be real, especially if_ you _hadn’t heard of it, Doctor.” Madame Vastra sipped her tea and placed the cup gently back on the saucer with the softest clink._

_“But it is, I’ve only spent the last month playing apprentice for them! Hidden in plain sight all this time. Load of fun it’s been, too, we’d just got hold of this fascinating pocket watch loaded with black d—”_

_“And I must say, I’m rather fond of this incarnation, Doctor. It… suits you.” Vastra’s scaled cheeks rose under her eyes over the rim of her cup, and Jenny laid a reminding hand on her shoulder._

_“Thanks very much, but let’s stay on task here.” The Doctor propped her feet on a footstool, and Jenny threw her a grateful look._

_“And the woman in our spare bedroom…_ is _H.G. Wells?”_

_“Yep.” The Doctor combed her fingers through one side of her hair. “You read any of her works? Very inventive stuff, even if it’s nearly pure fantasy.”_

_“I’ve heard tell of them, but I have less time these days to chase fairy tales than I’d like, let alone read them,” said Vastra. The teacup and saucer came to rest on the little table beside her armchair. “But this warehouse you’ve described sounds appropriate to our expertise.”_

_“Brilliant. When she wakes up, tell her you’re friends of mine and I might have broken the rules of telling only one person, but I had to dash. Whole universe out there still needs me.” The Doctor leapt to her feet. “And when you get there, give Caturanga my best and tell him sorry I couldn’t stay, which is why I’ve sent you. They need all the help they can get. Can’t miss him, balding fellow in glasses, very clever, even if he is a poor chess player.” She started toward the door. “Oh! Almost forgot. Give him this.” She handed Jenny an envelope sealed with blue wax imprinted with the TARDIS._

_“If you don’t mind my asking, Doctor,” said Vastra, rising from her own chair. “What happened between you and Miss Wells?”_

_The Doctor thanked Strax in the hall for bringing her coat. Shrugging it on, she wrinkled her nose as she ad-libbed an answer. “Oh, you know. We had a bit of an adventure. Saved the universe. The usual.” She smoothed her coat and her face to match, and opened the door for herself. “Good to see you, as always. Will have to bring the fam back here someday. Take care. And thanks for the tea.” And she stepped out into the gray morning with the splash of a thinning puddle, the TARDIS’ wheezing not long behind._

Helena crumpled another leaf of parchment, judging the calculations scrawled on it absolutely incorrect. That can’t be it, she thought, there must be another way to understand the TARDIS. The electric lights flickered in the confines of her workshop, but it was at least better than candlelight. Nikola had only been too eager to install them for her, to assist a fellow inventor, he’d said. She glanced at a diagram of the TARDIS console she’d drawn from memory, at the litter of rejected paper, enough to make her head spin with the barest fragments of numbers peeking out from the folds and crushed edges. There was an element missing, she knew it, something she’d overlooked in plugging the year, coordinates for the family house in Paris, the time of evening, all the estimated angles of levers and degrees rotated she’d spotted the Doctor set into the console with the cheeriest of hums and one-sided banter. It was the work of a madwoman, Helena admitted to herself, scrubbing the exhaustion from her eyes. But the payoff would be exactly what she’d been hoping for when she first dreamed up time travel. For it to be within inches of her tantalized fingertips, after all this time mourning…

A knock on the floorboards above interrupted her thoughts. “Helena? Are you in? I’ve just finished organizing the Warehouse Seven archives by color… You wouldn’t believe it, but Ghengis Khan had an impeccable sense of style and loved pastels.” She scrambled to sweep the crumpled papers into the waste bin, and something in Helena’s mind clicked into place, a silver bullet lodged in its chamber. Of course.

“Just a moment,” she called back, pulling a mechanical manual over the console sketch. Her desk clear, she pressed a panel on the wall, and a section of the far ceiling lowered in, revealing the Doctor, her hands in her pockets, leaning over to peer in at her.

“And I’ve just had the most fascinating chat with Alice Liddell, that mirror is just so _cool_. There I was waving and acting of my own accord on one side and poor Alice was proper confused by it all, there being two of me. But we got to be good friends in the end, I told her about that time I met Charles Dodgson and we banished an alien cat that he wrote into the Cheshire variety in her story. Though, I don’t think she ought to be let out of that mirror any time soon.” The Doctor strolled down the ramp, still speaking half nonsenses very quickly, which Helena took as a sign that yet another artifact had refused to take full effect in her presence; even a wily actress like Alice couldn’t even begin to emulate the Doctor’s airs and fancies.

“How many times do I have to tell you that the artifacts aren’t toys, Doctor?” she asked. “Alice’s mirror and those in the Dark Vault least of all. She did cost a few lives when they brought her in, you know.”

“Oh, but they’re such fun,” said the Doctor happily. “Nifty little effects, I haven’t even seen these downsides you’ve told me so much about.”

“Then you are either incredibly lucky or incredibly stupid to handle them so casually,” said Helena, leaning against the wall. “Might I remind you that agents have _died_ in their carelessness?”

The Doctor frowned guiltily. “You’re right. I’m sorry,” she said, lowering her head. “It’s just, I’ve met so many of these people who owned these artifacts, been all over Earth in every era, it’s like seeing my old friends again. And you of all people would understand that I wish I could see them again or bring them back, but I can’t.” Helena turned her head toward the wall at her left, sinking her teeth into her lower lip to prevent it from trembling. “And, I’m not sure if this makes sense to you, but all this stuff… it just _feels_ like they’re here with me. And it’s not them, is it? But it is? At least in some part.” The Doctor licked her lips as she pulled her mouth to one side. “Well. And it smells nice here, fudge and apples, I do love both of them.”

“I think I’m still having a little trouble believing you about all the things you’ve said you’ve done, Doctor,” said Helena, edging the conversation into another territory.

“What? You’ve only seen the TARDIS in action, is that not enough to convince you?” The Doctor’s nose scrunched with offense, pulling her upper lip with it.

“Strictly speaking, I’ve only seen the TARDIS go across London and back a handful of times,” said Helena, raising her eyebrows. She tapped her opposite bicep with a long fingertip. “And for all I know, it could just be another artifact we’ll have to confiscate in the future.”

“She is not an artifact! And you wouldn’t know the first thing about how to move her, let alone confiscate her into the Warehouse,” the Doctor said, crossing her arms. “She wouldn’t let you, first off.”

“Anything unexplained can most often be explained as an artifact,” said Helena, quoting almost verbatim from the agents’ manual.

“What about my sonic, then?” The Doctor ignited it, making the lights flare.

“Artifact.”

“The dimensional engineering in my pockets?”

“Your coat’s an artifact.”

“My uncanny ability to beat Caturanga every time at chess?”

“There are chess artifacts, aren’t there?”

“You’re an _inventor, H.G. Wells,”_ the Doctor said, “as much you are a Warehouse agent! And you of all people ought to know that sufficient technology is often impossible to differentiate from magic. Or artifacts.”

“Is that why you’re here, then?” asked Helena, her voice silky. “To understand the technology behind artifacts?”

“After a fashion.” The Doctor crossed her arms to mirror Helena, planting her boots a little wider than her shoulder width. “You could say I got curious.”

“Because I stumbled into your box and baited you with an offer of endless wonder?”

“Didn’t need the offer of endless wonder,” said the Doctor, her eyes burning gold in the Tesla light. “Already got that in spades. The whole universe of possibilities and impossibilities out there to explore?” She angled her head, a birdlike motion. “Makes artifacts here look like toys to me.”

Helena’s mind clawed to keep up. “It still doesn’t explain why you claim to be an alien.”

“I claim to be an alien _because_ I’m one,” groaned the Doctor, her head dipping backward so she could glare at the ceiling.

“Or you could be under the influence of an artifact.”

“Oh, _hang_ the artifacts, Helena, _this,”_ she said, stomping over and placing Helena’s hand over her chest. “…is what makes me an alien. Two hearts. It’s _biology._ Not magic, not a _bloody_ artifact.” And there again was the curious quadruple beat Helena had felt in the alley weeks ago, stronger this time, and she could feel it alternate on either sides of her palm. Her breath caught, as she looked into the Doctor’s furious hazel eyes, which somehow gave the impression of boundless, youthful energy, with an ancient soul peering out through them. And she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t a little in love with her, even after this short time, this strange, prattling woman and her reported time machine. Or maybe she was just in love with the idea of a time machine and the Doctor was intimately tied to it. She pushed that away, refocused on the task at hand.

“Then. Show. Me,” she growled, pulling her hand back.

“Didn’t think I’d have to,” murmured the Doctor through her teeth, leaning closer, a note of danger in her voice.

“I could say it’s an order.”

“Don’t think you will.” She flourished her coat a little as she stepped back, and they eyed each other, at an impasse. The Doctor seemed to contemplate something, her eyes flicking over Helena with newfound suspicion. “All right,” she said finally, to Helena’s surprise, softening her guarded expression somewhat, though she still squinted at her. “I’ll take you for a spin. Round trip in the TARDIS, on me.”

“Where should we go?” asked the Doctor as they strode through Caturanga’s office toward the door to the outside.

“Paris,” said Helena, too quickly.

“Summat about Paris got your attention?” asked the Doctor. “Not very exotic, is it? I’m sure there’s a boat could take you across—”

“Why ask for the moon? Surely a simple skip to Paris shouldn’t be _too_ difficult for your box.” Helena set the bait.

“Not at all. Just thought you’d maybe want to see the stars up close or another planet, something far in the past?”

“Paris could be in the past.”

“When, exactly?”

“Dealer’s choice.” Another bait, and only one part of the console would have to be adjusted, if she could figure out which one.

“Third century, B.C. it is, then,” said the Doctor with a shrug. “Give the Gauls a bit of a mix up, but who’s worried?”

“Good night, ladies,” said Wolcott mildly from behind them, pulling on his coat as he headed for the door. He picked up his umbrella from the stand. “Looks like rain, stay dry.”

“Oh, Wolly! Brilliant,” said the Doctor, seizing his elbow. “Helena and I have a little wager, you see. You might be just the chaperone for it.”

“Might I?” asked Wolcott with his familiar bemused expression. Always half a step behind, Wolcott, thought Helena. Something else nagged in the back of her mind against her eagerness to be off, but she swatted it down like an irritating fly. The Doctor could bring along whomever she pleased; it didn’t matter.

“Come on,” said the Doctor, leading them out the front. “Let’s get a shift on.”

“The whole time, your box has been like this?” asked Wolcott, gaping at the control room. Helena drummed her fingers on the panel of console that had seemed most promising, trying to appear as though she weren’t watching the Doctor’s every move. “This whole time, we were watching you refuse room and board and disappear into this little compartment and the _whole time_ you had an _entire_ …”

“Pack it in, Wolly,” said Helena in a condescending singsong.

“Right,” said Wolcott. “I’ll just… be over here if you need me.” He shuffled to one side and seated himself on the stairs there, which seemed to be something of a relief. “What exactly is this wager?”

“Oh, _H.G. Wells,”_ said the Doctor, emphasizing every syllable of her name, “doesn’t believe my TARDIS is a time machine. Or alien tech. But she’s so much more than that, aren’t you?” The Doctor patted the console, and the TARDIS hummed.

Wolcott gulped. “T—time machine, H.G., you can’t be—” he spluttered and crossed back over to Helena. Pulling her aside, he lowered his voice. “Is this advisable?”

“It’s my best chance, Wolcott, you _know_ how long I’ve worked for this,” Helena hissed back.

“Helena, your… _history_ with time travel…”

“What about it?” She treated him to her most deadly glare.

“I just… hope you know what you’re doing,” he said softly, backing away.

“I do.” She pulled him back, her eyes trained on the Doctor as she selected a biscuit. “When she pulls that big lever, _don’t_ look at it,” she said, and Wolcott obeyed. “Keep her distracted while I make a slight modification.” Wolcott drew a shaky breath, his upper lip starting to shine with sweat, and he nodded. “Good man,” said Helena.

“Just about ready to go,” said the Doctor, crunching her biscuit. “Just have to set the date…” She fiddled with the hourglass, turning it over, and flipped three switches underneath it. As she put her hand on the large lever, the Doctor fixed Helena with her most intense stare, an expression that conjured a tendril of doubt to curl in Helena’s stomach. “We’re off,” said the Doctor, pulling the lever down.

William Wolcott was not a man to act upon his instincts without first thoroughly consulting his emotions and better nature. It was part of the reason Caturanga had recruited him in the first place: where Helena followed her instincts like a bloodhound to a scent, Wolcott tempered this with his dithering, and an equilibrium was achieved through much bickering. Helena was often the dominant force in their partnership, with Wolcott in support, though he did occasionally surprise her. Helena had expected him to ask the Doctor a question, to bump into her and apologize while she made her adjustment to the coordinates in the TARDIS controls. She did _not_ expect him to _full-body tackle_ the Doctor to the other side of the control room. The Doctor barely had time to exclaim with surprise before they hit the floor, the wind knocked out of her.

“Do it,” he yelled at Helena over the TARDIS’ groaning, struggling to keep the Doctor pinned under him. Helena dashed forward, reversing the hourglass and reaching for two of the switches that appeared most hopeful. _Three for third century…_ But no sooner had she flipped the first switch than the TARDIS gave a sickening lurch, and she was thrown against a pillar, stunned.

“I’m very sorry, Doctor,” said Wolcott as they wrestled.

“Not as sorry as I’m about to be,” said the Doctor, and Helena didn’t see what she’d done, but a moment later, Wolcott rolled off the Doctor, immobilized and supine.

“What’re you doing?” yelled the Doctor, stumbling to her feet to grab hold of another pillar across from Helena. The TARDIS groaned louder and rocked violently.

“What I had to,” shouted Helena. “It was my last hope to save her.” Against the pitch and tilt, she staggered to grab hold of the console and spotted the circular platform from their first trip to Warehouse Twelve. That was it.

The Doctor spotted the dart of her eyes. “No. No, _don’t—”_ But Helena slapped her hand on what she remembered the Doctor calling the telepathic circuit, and the TARDIS screeched, a bolt of electricity arcing from the central crystal to land on the feebly stirring Wolcott.

“Wolly!” cried the Doctor, dashing to him. Helena panted, keeping her hold on the panel, and she turned in time to see the Doctor check his vitals, listening against his chest. The Doctor bowed her head for a moment, the TARDIS lights flashing red and orange around them. When she looked up, Helena quailed, as she understood the Doctor just a little more than she had two seconds ago. “You have to stop this, Helena,” said the Doctor, rising from the floor, her eyes alight with what must have been a thousand years of rage.

“It was the only way,” Helena pleaded, suddenly feeling small and silly through her desperation.

“Tearing a hole in the universe was _not_ the answer, Helena!”

“What would you know about it?” Helena snapped. “You act like you _know…”_ Tears she’d been damming up since the Doctor’s arrival, since the arrival of the TARDIS and all the hope it bore for her, started gushing forth.

“Because I DO know,” roared the Doctor. And as if to accent its master’s voice, the TARDIS gave its loudest groan yet. Helena’s knees shook under her, against the straining machine, against the way it tried to toss her like a bucking, unbroken horse. Christina was on the other end of this ride; she had to believe she was… The TARDIS gave an almost imperceptible beep over its wheezing, and the Doctor softened. “It’s not what you think it is, Helena,” she said, staggering to the console beside her. “Bringing back the dead… it’s not something you can do. Not even I can. Death, it’s a fixed point in time. The TARDIS can’t bring Christina back, not without ripping a massive hole in the universe. And it can’t save poor Wolcott now you’ve done this.” Her voice shook with restraint.

“I don’t care,” said Helena, curling to the floor, tears spilling into her lap. Still, she pressed her hand to the panel. “I’d sacrifice anything, _everything_ for her.”

"I thought you'd do this, you know," said the Doctor, and though she was sweating with the effort of hanging on, Helena's blood turned icy. "I had a feeling you'd want to go back, ever since the lapis lazuli."

"You _let_ me do this?" So the game had been set, the gambit played, and Helena was losing badly in one fell swoop.

"I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt, Helena. I wanted you to prove me wrong, but..." She gripped another section of the console as the TARDIS tilted again, as though it had crashed into something and carried on in its flight.

Helena gasped, words failing her. "But... Christina..."

“You think you’re the only parent who’s ever lost a child?” shouted the Doctor, her rage stoked again, the TARDIS whining as it veered clumsily into the past. “You think the universe is yours to sacrifice? Look at me, Helena,” she said furiously, and Helena peered up into those burning hazel eyes, full of fathomless grief and wonders she couldn’t comprehend. “The universe is not yours to destroy for one life. But it is mine to protect. For _trillions_ , probably more. And if that means I have to stop you, then I will.” Her voice lowered with her last sentence, and she fixed her hands around Helena’s wrist. Helena could think of nearly three hundred ways she’d learned to break a wrist grab in Kempo, but she couldn’t move to execute even one, fixed by the Doctor’s stare. The tension fizzled between their eyes, the TARDIS groaning toward Paris. And it snapped, Helena relenting on the floor with a sob as the Doctor pried her hand free from the console.

The last thing she felt after the raw emptiness in her stomach was the Doctor jamming a finger into the soft spot at her throat, and she fell unconscious.


	6. Newly Extended Fam

“This is proper weird,” said Ryan, looking up and around at the shelves. “I mean, it’s awesome, but it’s _weird.”_ He reached to touch the zoetrope nearest to him and Claudia swatted his hand.

“No touchy, there, pal,” said Claudia. “Antiques Roadshow of crazy, yes. Touching the antiques in the roadshow, no. Not if you don’t want your mind broken by an evil wheel.” With a mollified expression, Ryan quickly shoved his hands in his pockets.

“What, this?” said the Doctor, giving it a spin. Claudia’s eyes bugged, and the Doctor stopped the zoetrope mid-motion. “Neat little proto-animation, isn’t it?”

Helena laid a hand on Claudia’s shoulder. “You’ve always had a way with the artifacts, haven’t you, Doctor?” she laughed, but then her face pinched inward. “Best not to give Claudia a heart attack.”

“Right you are, Helena.” The Doctor, too, shoved her hands in her coat pockets, grinning. “Sorry, Claudia.”

“Remind me to get that good when I’m caretaker, Jinksy,” Claudia muttered to Steve, who had joined them for the tour. Before he could answer, however, the Doctor gave a delighted cry.

“Oh, Jinksy?” she said. “Like Banksy, but American! You wouldn’t happen to be an art activist, too, would you?” She turned her beam to Steve, who smiled faintly back.

“I think I’ve been Jinksy a _little_ longer than Banksy’s been around,” he said, one eye squinting. “But Claud’s the only one who ever—”

“Claud, H.G., Jinksy, Mykes,” said the Doctor, as though she was chewing each moniker, “I think we ought to get on with the nicknames, fam. Wouldn’t want to fall behind.” She laced her fingers behind her back as she addressed her companions, and Yaz and Graham exchanged a look.

“Sort of already got that covered, Doc,” said Graham.

“Yeah, Khan and Sinclair are good,” said Ryan. Yaz nodded.

“But none of them is as good as _Jinksy,”_ protested the Doctor. “I guess you _could_ call me Banksy and it’d even out…” She paused dramatically. “Or could you?”

“Wait,” interjected Claudia. _“You’re_ Banksy?”

“Or am I?” asked the Doctor, meeting her eyes.

“Steve…” said Claudia weakly, groping for his wrist. “Could you… do the thing?”

“It doesn’t seem to work on her,” admitted Steve. “I haven’t gotten a clear read all day.”

“But you’re our lie detector. The human polygraph—ouch!” Helena elbowed Claudia in the ribs too late, the realization dawning on Yaz, Ryan and Graham’s faces.

“Human lie detector?” asked Ryan.

“Are you saying you brought him along in case we stole anything?” Yaz’s head jutted forward as she asked indignantly.

“Or I could just be a nice person who wanted to help,” said Steve with an unconvincing shrug. An hour ago, Pete, Myka, and Artie had drifted apart from the tour party, citing the need to reorganize the Ovoid Quarantine, leaving the fam in “Claudia’s capable hands,” as Artie had said with a meaningful glance her way. Steve had volunteered to tag along, and Helena said she’d wanted to catch up with the Doctor as they strolled—though they’d yet to do any of that, both refusing to make eye contact as they did their best to keep the tour lighthearted. Eyes flitted from person to person in the painful silence, and Claudia’s hand edged toward her Tesla, which she’d holstered in her belt.

“None of that, please, Claudia,” breezed the Doctor, waving her sonic. There was a snap and a spark, and Claudia yelped, her Tesla short-circuited in her hands. The Doctor flourished her sonic next at Steve, who flinched, though nothing seemed to happen. “Just an everyday, ordinary human male,” she said, masking her disappointment as she read the sonic. “With, hang on… advanced development in the prefrontal cortex? So that’s where you get it from! Well done, Jinksy. Gorgeous brain.” Steve’s expression flickered from slight offense to impressed to flattered in a two second span. “But you needn’t have worried about us, we’re just curious travelers.”

“The jig, it seems, is up,” said Helena, stepping between them all. “You’ll have to excuse our precaution, Doctor, but as we said before, we can’t be too careful.”

“You could’ve told us he’s a lie detector,” said Yaz, adopting her best authoritative voice as she stepped forward. The Doctor held out an arm to stop her.

“We didn’t want to dampen the _cheery mood,”_ said Claudia, looking between Helena and the Doctor. “Seriously, what is _with_ you two? You’ve been avoiding each other like the wrong ends of magnets.”

“Everyone, just take it easy,” said Steve, holding up his hands.

“No, mate, I think you and your freaky lie detection ought to leave well enough alone,” said Graham, and the Doctor turned to hold him back as well. Ryan crossed his arms.

“Claudia, there’s a history we’ve yet to fully reconcile,” began Helena, but she was interrupted by a metallic buzz from her pocket. She opened the Farnsworth to Artie’s nose at the fore of the camera.

“Where are you? We’ve got a ping.”

“A Pting?” said the Doctor, edging into Helena for a look, her nose working into its signature wrinkle. “Oh, Artie! Would you look at that! You do realize FaceTime is a thing nowadays?” Again, the sonic screwdriver whirred. “We didn’t have them at Twelve, did we, H.G.?”

“FaceTime isn’t untraceable and on an unhackable frequency,” retorted Artie. “Get up here, we’ve got work to do.” The call ended abruptly.

“I bet I could hack it,” muttered the Doctor, and Helena closed the Farnsworth with a snap.

“Increasing seismic activity in Yorkshire,” said Artie, jabbing his finger at one of the monitors. “Fortunately no casualties, they’ve been minor quakes, but they’re increasing on the Richter scale hourly. Last one was a magnitude three-point-three. We’re projecting upwards of four-point-five in the next two hours.” The office had never been more crowded; all six Warehouse agents packed shoulder to shoulder with the Doctor and her companions, huddled around Artie’s desk. Trailer curled under the desk at Artie’s feet, watching the guests with a vague concern. The Doctor caught the dog’s eye.

“Sorry, mate,” she murmured, and Trailer put his head on his paws, placated by the acknowledgement.

“Yorkshire? But,” started Yaz.

“That’s our home,” said Ryan.

“First aliens, now earthquakes, I thought we’d seen the end of the madness at home after Tim Shaw,” said Graham. They looked back at the overlapping circles on the map screen, and as one, the fam paled.

“Then I suspect you’ll want us to handle it,” said Artie, patronizing. “This is, as they say, where the magic happens.” He clapped once and started pointing at people. “Claudia, I’m going to need a triangulation on the epicenters of these quakes, see if you can get a central location.”

“On it,” said Claudia, breaking free of the group to seize her laptop. Her fingers flew over the keys, and the Doctor’s eyebrows lifted of their own accord: Claudia had to be the fastest human hacker she’d seen at work. Not as fast as she was herself, but then, she wasn’t human, either.

“Artie,” Helena began, unheeded.

“Pete, Myka,” continued Artie, and on instinct, they started moving toward the door at the sound of their names. “I want you geared up and ready to go in no less than an hour—”

“An hour then a flight, are you taking the piss? Sheffield could well be flat by then,” interrupted Graham.

“Helena, see if you can get in touch with Yorkshire law enforcement, we need everywhere in the area evacuated.”

“I’m Yorkshire law enforcement,” volunteered Yaz.

“Good, get on the telegraph.”

“Telegraph?”

“Steve, I need you booking flights ASAP,” continued Artie. “We’ll get there as fast as we can and sort this out.” He addressed the Doctor and her companions last. “Unless you’ve got a speedier solution, we’ll take care of this. It is, of course, what we do best.” The Doctor opened her mouth, but Helena spoke before she could.

“Why are we mucking on about flights and speed when we’ve got a time machine?”

The rumble of activity in the office halted as everyone turned to look at the Doctor, who exchanged a glance with Helena. A stack of files toppled to the floor with the crisp flutter of wavering paper, unnoticed. Several moments passed, Helena’s eyes locked in an intense, silent exchange with the Doctor’s, and the Doctor split into a broad grin.

“Look at this! Newly extended fam! I love it.”

“Don’t touch anything,” warned Ryan as they all crossed the threshold into the control room, which was considerably roomier than Artie’s office. Graham and Yaz assumed places on the far side of the room, exchanging knowing smiles. Except for Helena, every agent’s mouth dangled open as they clutched their respective field gear; Teslas and Gooery equipment hanging from limp arms.

“Now, Ryan, that’s no way to treat guests,” said the Doctor, dashing up to the console with energetic bravado. “You can touch the biscuit dispenser and _only_ the biscuit dispenser,” she said, tossing a custard cream to Pete, who caught it, never one to miss snack time. “This,” she continued, but didn’t get further before every agent of Warehouse Thirteen spoke at once.

“Impossible,” said Artie, shaking his head in little motions. He set his trusty bag of tricks on the floor so he could mop his forehead.

“All this fits inside that little blue box?” said Pete. He shoved the biscuit into his mouth, whole. “Oh! Good cookies in the spaceship,” he said with delight, one cheek bulging.

“But… this can’t be… _real,”_ said Myka, her hand closing on Helena’s arm.

“Bigger on the inside, I _told_ you,” murmured Helena against her hair.

“I didn’t think alien tech would look so… _alternative medicine?”_ said Claudia, staring at the crystal pillars.

“I’d think it was a lie if I didn’t see it with my own eyes,” said Steve.

The Doctor waited patiently for everyone to stop talking before she answered everything at once. “This,” she started again, “is my TARDIS. Time and Relative Dimension in Space. Yes, it is bigger on the inside; no I wasn’t lying to you this whole time. It’s not impossible, just a bit of dimensional engineering, and the chameleon circuit got stuck on the blue box, but I rather like it that way, as much as I _like_ the alternative medicine look. The crystals really bring out her console. Yes, the biscuits are ace, she makes them herself, and she is very much real and not an artifact. Everyone happy?”

Everyone stared at her.

“Good, let’s get a shift on. Extended Warehouse fam? You’ll want to hold onto something.” There was a scramble as everyone moved at once to secure a place along the wall, on a rail, or against a pillar, and the Doctor darted around the perimeter of the console, setting the familiar coordinates for present day Sheffield with gusto. “Claudia,” she called, and Claudia’s head snapped up. “If you’ve brought your laptop, I’ll need those coordinates you triangulated.”

“You’ve got it,” said Claudia, hurrying forward. The Doctor plugged a stray wire into a port on the laptop. “Your Dolorian’s not going to fry my hard drive once we hit eighty-eight miles per hour, is it?”

“Oh, she’s got references, I love that, gold star for Claudia,” said the Doctor, grinning as she aimed her sonic at the computer. “To answer your question, Claudia, we’re not going to _hit_ eighty-eight _miles_ per hour. Hang onto that part there, if you please. More like we’ll be going eighty-eight thousand _light years_ per hour, give or take, but who’s counting?” She patted Claudia’s shoulder and continued working. “Speed and acceleration in the space time vortex don’t quite work like that, but it was the best I could think of on the fly so you could understand.” She pressed another button firmly before helping herself to a custard cream.

“Are you sure this thing’s got enough juice for all of us?” asked Pete from his corner of the stairs.

“Oi, we’re not amateurs!” The Doctor craned over the console at Pete, and as if to accentuate her point, the TARDIS gave a sharp chirrup. “Room for all and then some aboard here, we haven’t even shown you the karaoke buses! Or the Jacuzzi!”

“Karaoke—?” started Pete, but the Doctor carried on over him.

“Suppose we’ll have time for a tour when we get back.” She stepped back from the console with satisfaction, all eyes still fixed on her. “Just set it to two hours before the first quakes, you’ll never get… what did you call it again?”

“A ping,” grumbled Artie, gripping his section of wall.

“Right, your _ping_ , it won’t come through since we’ll have handled it by the time you received it. I hope. Ought to give those Farnsworth devices a tune-up, I really thought you’d said _Pting_ back then, but I think we’ve had enough of those, haven’t we, fam?”

“Definitely,” said Yaz.

“Everyone hang onto something, strap in, much as you can. Helena,” the Doctor called gently, and she rested her hand on the last lever. “Would you like to do it together this time?”

Helena felt her mouth open and shut, as she struggled to find an answer. But then, Myka prodded her to her feet, and she found herself standing beside the Doctor, their hands joined on the lever.

“Can I just say,” said the Doctor, and Helena could hear the thrill in her voice, rising against the back of her throat. “And I didn’t get to say it back in London, but _time travel_ with _H.G. Wells_ , how _brilliant_ is that?”

In what Artie called a record time snag, bag, and tag, the whole extended fam succeeded in securing a photograph taken in Valdivia, Chile in 1960 shortly after a massive earthquake, plucked gently from the hands of a frightened child in pajamas whose grandfather had owned it.

“Hello,” said the Doctor, waving the others back, all of whom held a different neutralizing agent. Claudia had even brought along a pair of what she called goozookas, which Yaz and Steve held over their shoulders. As the Doctor approached the trembling girl, she lowered herself onto hands and knees before sitting opposite her on the floor of her family’s flat. “I’m the Doctor. What’s your name?”

“Elena,” said the girl. As she trembled, the ground beneath them started to shake, and the team grabbed hold of walls and furniture to steady themselves.

“Doctor, if you could hurry up with the negotiations,” said Artie, his glasses askew.

“Right, was just getting to that,” retorted the Doctor. “Rome wasn’t built in a day, you know… though I helped speed that along… Oh! Which reminds me about that time I met Julius Caesar…”

“Doctor,” said Yaz pointedly, gripping the kitchen counter as another quake rumbled.

“I’m with Artie; Rome wasn’t built in a day, but Sheffield could be torn down in a few seconds,” said Graham.

“I’m _getting there_ , Graham, give me a moment—”

“Any _time_ now,” whined Pete, and the Doctor glared back at them all before returning her attention to the girl, her eyes softening.

“Looks like you’ve got something a little scary, Elena, could I take a look?” The shaking subsided somewhat as the Doctor sat cross-legged to face her, her elbows on her knees.

The girl nodded, and the Doctor waved her sonic over the photograph. “Spent a little time recalibrating the sonic to read artifact energy,” she explained to the team as she read the scan. “Ah. So that’s it. Elena.” She pocketed the sonic screwdriver, adopting her best friendly voice. “Your picture must make you feel so scared, doesn’t it? Can I take that away, please? You don’t have to be scared anymore. It’ll be alright. In fact…” She fished in her pockets, offering a custard cream with the kindest smile. “Trade you a biscuit. Got a couple marbles and rocks if you like those as well.”

“Your artifact responds to the emotional state of its user,” said the Doctor once they’d returned to the TARDIS. “Induces terror, increasing earthquake intensity gradually. A good job we found her before it had done any real damage.”

“And Sheffield’s still standing,” said Graham. “Well done, Doc.”

“I’m still baffled,” said Artie, “about how you single-handedly captured an artifact from the most powerful earthquake in history, no gloves, no goo, no static bag. Like the artifact just _responded_ to you.”

“I could tell you about her and Alice Liddell,” said Helena, and Artie did a double take.

“Not the most powerful earthquake in _all_ of history,” added the Doctor, matter-of-factly, watching Myka deposit the photograph into a static bag with a shower of purple sparks. “Love the gloves, by the way, excellent color.”

“Yeah, purple’s kind of our thing,” said Claudia, opening a canister of thick, bubbling, goo, which slopped and sloshed inside.

“Oh! I’ll need to take a look at a _lot_ of that. Not because I want to play with it or anything,” said the Doctor, scanning the contents. “Strictly research purposes.”

“You wanna clean the Gooery when we get back?” asked Claudia, her fingers crossed behind her back. She couldn’t resist a conspiratorial grin.

“Would I ever!” cried the Doctor.

“Don’t make the guests do your chores, Claudia,” said Artie.

“Oh, it’s no trouble!” said the Doctor. “It’ll make up for the fact that the TARDIS _might_ have _slightly_ reformatted your computer. I’m sorry.” She scrunched her nose.

Claudia’s face melted into a mixture of stricken grief and horror. “Is it… an…. _upgrade_ kind of reformatting?” she asked tentatively.

“Let’s say my Dolorian didn’t fry your hard drive?” The Doctor grimaced, showing Claudia the newly alien format. Letters and characters that were definitely not English or any other human language spiraled in green along the screen.

Claudia grimaced as well. “Good thing I backed up to the Warehouse,” she said in a strained voice. “Can it still at least run Python?”

“Oh, it can run all three hundred thousand universal _variations_ on Python! And more. The TARDIS tends to rub off on linked technologies. I can fix it. Probably.” The Doctor shrugged.

“Are you kidding? Teach me everything you know, oh wise master.” Claudia pretended to kowtow.

The Doctor inhaled through her teeth. “Just don’t call me ‘master,’ and we’ve got a deal.”

Yaz and Steve carried the unspent goozookas into the TARDIS. “You know, the Doctor doesn’t like guns,” said Yaz.

“Oh, these won’t do any harm. Just covers you in goo if you don’t aim carefully. Or even if you do,” he said, taking hers to rest against the wall. “We use them for the big things.”

“Yeah, I don’t imagine that little girl would have appreciated it. Or maybe she would have, getting covered in goo. I know some people who might,” said Yaz, massaging the back of her neck as she watched the Doctor dip a finger in the goo canister while Artie’s back was turned.

“She’s good.”

“Hm?”

“The Doctor. She… has a way with the artifacts. With people, all of it,” said Steve, leaning back against the wall. “Kind of makes me wish you’d stick around. We could use the extra hands. And the convenient time machine.”

She met Steve’s gaze and found she couldn’t maintain the eye contact for long; something about the way he stared at her was unsettling, like he somehow knew too much just by looking. She changed the subject. “Are you really a human lie detector?”

“Tell me a lie.” He shrugged a little, and his smile was subtle, but not complacent.

“No, it doesn’t work that way, you have to ask me a question, otherwise you know I’m lying.” Yaz leaned against the wall with him, and she spotted the Doctor taste the goo and recoil with disgust before putting her hands behind her back as Artie turned around.

“Okay. How do you feel about the Doctor?”

Yaz dry swallowed. Of course he asked that one. Her words halted as she selected each one with the utmost care. “She’s… different. In a good way. Special.”

“Technically not a lie, but not all of the truth, either,” said Steve, not missing a beat. He looked at her. “Don’t be afraid of it, Yaz.”

“What, your freaky superpower?” She failed to brush off the advice with humor.

Steve chuckled. “Feelings aren’t facts, but _they_ don’t lie. Just some food for thought.” The Doctor was now scanning all the Warehouse equipment with curiosity. From her pocket, she pulled out what appeared to be a Tesla similar to Helena’s to show Claudia, who seized it with a spark of delighted interest, and Yaz bit her lower lip as the Doctor grinned over at her and Steve.

“She’s really in her element with the unknown,” said Yaz. “Takes it in stride, like a puzzle to solve. The Warehouse… I haven’t seen her so happy before, and she’s usually quite the optimist.” The Doctor had begun to set the TARDIS to return them to the Warehouse, the ship humming to life around them all. “I don’t know if she’s had this much fun in a while, even with us.”

“I… don’t know if you could call our job _fun,”_ said Steve, scratching his chin. “Not all the time, anyway.”

“Hey, hey, hey, I thought we were supposed to get _ze grand tour,”_ said Pete across the room, munching yet another custard cream as Graham watched, offended by the sheer volume of biscuits he had consumed. “I was _promised_ a Jacuzzi.”

“I’m right chuffed, fam,” said the Doctor, closing the TARDIS door behind her. “I didn’t think I’d missed my days at Warehouse Twelve so much, given certain events, but that was a proper adventure. So glad we decided to drop in. Not sure I was fond those biscuits they had, though. Oatmeal Scotchies, was it?”

“I thought they were all right,” said Graham, patting his pockets. He’d taken a few for the road, saying they'd pair nicely with Yorkshire tea and sandwiches. Artie had appreciated his enjoyment and insisted on giving them a whole plateful.

“How did you not know the Warehouse was a thing this whole time, then?” asked Ryan. He tapped the new installment on the console, a fragment of repurposed Farnsworth technology that could give the Warehouse a direct line to the TARDIS, should anything alien come knocking. The Doctor had also given the Warehouse equipment a full tune-up, sharing mechanical tips with Claudia as they scoured the Gooery and soldered pieces of Tesla upgrades together.

“Chalking it up to the agents are very good at their jobs, keeping the secret. And a dash of coincidence,” said the Doctor, spinning the hourglass. “Right place, wrong time, wrong place, right time, until Helena smacked into me in London.”

“What’re the odds of just running into H.G. Wells while piloting the TARDIS?” asked Yaz, sitting on the stairs. “That can’t have been a happy coincidence, no matter what you say about roaming the universe and stumbling upon magical artifacts.”

“It eventually wasn’t a happy coincidence, Yaz,” said the Doctor idly, turning a crank. She didn’t bother to explain this. “But I’m glad we patched things up. Would have been a shame to lose such a friend as her.”

The tour of the TARDIS had had to be a truncated one, if by truncated, they meant that several of the infinite rooms had to be skipped, as there wouldn’t have been enough time in any human life to explore the whole thing. Even shortened, the tour took three days, and the Doctor had had to calm Artie’s nerves about lost time with the airy statement of “time machine.” And despite seeing only a fraction of the TARDIS interior, the Warehouse agents met each installment with a mixture of delight and wonder.

Pete reveled in one of the karaoke buses, challenging Claudia and Myka to a sing off that went rather badly, as everyone had to screw up their eyes and plug their ears to his rendition of Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven is a Place on Earth.” The Doctor gamely sang Coldplay's "Yellow," and Yaz stepped in with a very good “Black Horse and the Cherry Tree,” which surprised Ryan and Graham, but it was unanimously agreed that Claudia won the wager with her spirited cover of “Cherry Bomb” by The Runaways, and she did a lap of high fives, much to Pete’s chagrin. He cheered up at the promised Jacuzzi room, begging for a soak, and they all spent a happy afternoon lounging in the warm water, drinks floating beside them, the Doctor on lifeguard duty in all her clothes and her hovering inner tube.

Claudia went wild for the architectural reconfiguration system, running up to the tree with a squeal of delight the other agents hadn’t ever heard her utter.

“You’re saying this can make anything?” she asked, ducking and weaving under the hanging lanterns, her voice thick in her throat.

“Anything mechanical you like, yeah,” said the Doctor, basking in her delight.

“So if I ask for a Tesla-goozooka hybrid…” Claudia shivered at the thought, and Myka and Helena exchanged a glance with Steve; hybridizing the Tesla equipment with Gooery gear had been a pet project of Claudia’s for some time—for efficiency, she’d claimed—and had seen some spectacular failures, often covering the young agent with electrical burns and a thick layer of goo.

“You’d have a Tesla-goozooka,” finished the Doctor, a mischievous gleam in her eye. “Want to give it a go?”

Abigail, who had complained at missing the adventure in Sheffield, had been invited along for the tour, and she confidently asked to bring her camera. The Doctor agreed, saying that the TARDIS was very photogenic, and when they arrived at the rainforest and floating gardens, Abigail almost got lost as she wandered off, taking photos of alien specimens with sincere fascination.

Even Steve couldn’t contain his excitement at the vast Zen garden that expanded to the size of a football field. The Doctor had raked intricate circular Gallifreyan in the sand, accenting with stones in all the appropriate Feng Shui styling, and eagerly pointed Steve to her meditation platform, which had the best view of the place, and he spent several hours breathing it in beside her.

As a proverbial olive branch, the Doctor provided Artie with a chest of various objects, which looked to the fam like old junk. She explained, flipping a heavy bronze coin, that they were artifacts she’d picked up in her travels, but hadn’t known where to put them since the disappearance of Warehouse Twelve, and dropping them off with her Victorian friends was no longer an option. Artie begrudgingly thanked her, but even he couldn’t resist a small smile as the Doctor described meeting each owner, prattling on about their respective quirks.

And Myka practically sprinted into the library—which dwarfed even the Warehouse’s collection—to pore over first editions from every era and planet, Helena at her heels with the most adoring of smiles. They even found translations of original H.G. Wells works in their own nook with squashy armchairs by a fireplace, and the Doctor presented Helena with a copy of _The Time Machine_ scripted in Gallifreyan.

“Bit of a joke,” she said sheepishly, “Your stories were called fairy tales where I’m from. Granny Five loved reading them to me at bedtime. I never got to tell you that.”

Helena traced the circles on the cover, and let the book fall open to a page that appeared to be bookmarked. She gasped, her eyes welling. A photograph the size of a postcard beamed out at her, the Doctor leaning into selfie frame with Christina.

Helena kissed her fingertips and touched Christina’s face. “How did you…” she managed finally.

“I might have invaded your mind a bit while you were unconscious back then,” said the Doctor, her arms crossed, shoulders pulling in. “I’m sorry, I had to be sure you weren’t a danger to the universe again. Get all the context.” Helena bit her lip, and Myka slid a comforting arm around her waist. “I saw your daughter, her life through your eyes. And she was brilliant. Truly.” The Doctor nodded. “And I saw you get that letter, two days too late, you never saw her before she died.” She looked at the floor. “And I understood why you did what you did to those men who killed her. I’d be a hypocrite to tell you off about it, the universe knows I’ve done worse for love.” Helena bowed her head, unable to take her eyes off the picture in her hand.

The Doctor took a breath. “And I heard you tell Myka that she’d taken ill just before the break in at the house in Paris. So a day before the incident, I made a house call.” Helena’s eyes snapped up to the Doctor’s, burning. “Couldn’t change anything, mind, still had the universe to preserve. But your housekeeper Sophie was a bit confused, said she hadn’t called for a doctor. A flash of psychic paper and a quick mention of your name was all she needed. Christina was excited to hear you’d sent me, even if it wasn’t quite true. She told me very matter-of-factly that her mummy was the cleverest woman in all of London, all the world, probably.” Helena breathed a laugh through her tears. “Not that she knew what it was, but I thought I’d ask her for a selfie, just a laugh, no harm done, nothing changed in the timeline.” The Doctor nodded at the book, which shook in Helena’s hand as she gripped it tightly. “I’d wanted to give it to you when next we met, because I’d already dropped you off at Vastra’s and clean forgot to leave it on the nightstand, but the fam was ready for pickup in Sheffield and I admit it slipped my mind for a while.” Her mouth pushed upward under her nose. “But I’m glad I found the Warehouse again. Feels a little like coming home. Felt right to return her to you now.”

Helena couldn’t say a word, and instead threw her arms around the Doctor, her tears forming a damp patch on the blue coat.

“Still, puts a whole new spin on the way the Earth works,” said Graham, pouring them all a cup of tea in the kitchen. They’d landed back in Sheffield and agreed a proper teatime was in order, to finish their discussion. “I wouldn’t mind helping them out from time to time, seemed a decent bunch.”

“How many artifacts do you think you’ve touched in your lifetime, Doctor?” asked Yaz, dunking a biscuit. “You’ve met all those people, seen all their lives, you were always two steps away from the Warehouse and there they were, right behind you every time.”

“Put a bit into perspective,” added Ryan. “What if you’re the source of all these artifacts and what they do?”

“Ryan Sinclair, are you suggesting that I might be playing Banksy throughout all of Earth’s history?” The Doctor’s mouth opened with delight.

“Or am I?” asked Ryan, grinning back as Yaz gently punched his shoulder.

“You never know,” said the Doctor, sipping her tea. “I still haven’t riddled out where they come from, artifacts. But then, even we should appreciate that some things might never be explained. Not easily, anyway.” They sat back for a reflective minute, in the sound of sipping and ceramic, before she continued, rising from her seat with her mug. “Another grand romp, eh, fam? Onto the next one?” And she led the charge back to the TARDIS console, her coat billowing behind her, the universe and everything in it within reach of her fingertips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all!
> 
> This was a beast of a chapter. Lots of loose ends to tie up. Stay tuned for an epilogue, I promise I haven't forgotten where we left our Victorian and Warehouse friends.
> 
> Thank you for reading, this has been a passion project and the culmination of over ten years of fangirling over these two shows, and the development of my writing craft.
> 
> Take care, be kind,  
> Jo


	7. Epilogue: Another Kind of Endless

“Arthur.”

Artie could swear he was getting too old for Mrs. Frederic’s sudden appearances all he liked, but still, with a strangled cry, he jumped at least an inch off his chair at the sound of her voice.

He composed himself. “Mrs. Frederic. I… didn’t see you there.”

“If I were Lattimer, Arthur, I’d say I was getting a vibe. The Warehouse is changed. Disturbed, somehow, and not in an all-bad way. Mr. Kosan informed me of your… guests.” Mrs. Frederic pursed her lips, her shrewd eyes narrowed. “You went above me.” She always had a way of stating the truth and making it sound like a threat.

“You were in Washington dealing with Congress! The regents were closer at hand. You know, we ought to have you on speed dial for these…” Mrs. Frederic arched a stern eyebrow at him, and Artie wrung his hands. “I had it under control,” he said finally.

“Clearly.” She nodded at the trunk. “I don’t think we’ve acquired so many artifacts overnight since we moved from Warehouse Twelve the second time.”

“It was a… gift. From our guests.” Artie scratched his beard. “Gonna take months of inventory to catalogue them all…” he grumbled under his breath.

“Problem?”

“No,” he said quickly.

“Tell me everything,” said Mrs. Frederic, and she rested on the end of the desk, her eyes fixed on him.

Artie filled her in. Over the course of his story, her face changed not one iota; she merely regarded him with her best stern expression. As he arrived at the part about Pete and karaoke, she held up a hand.

“I think I get the picture. And she gave you a trunkful of artifacts like it was nothing.”

“And a good thing she did, too, one of the talents from the parable is in—”

“Arthur.”

“Yes?” Artie tried to hide that he’d jumped again, but the sudden jerk in his voice had given it away.

“Whether or not she can prove it, no other aliens in my Warehouse.”

Artie drew a breath, and Mrs. Frederic rose from the desk. “Understood. No unexpected guests without your prior—”

“Oh, I didn’t mean she couldn’t come back. She’s an asset, a valuable one. I daresay Sheffield would have been decimated without that… what did you say she called it?”

“TARDIS.”

“Indeed. The Warehouse didn’t register a threat from her or any of her friends, and as you say, she has experience from Twelve. And she’s captured a number of artifacts without our ever having noticed them. The Doctor can come and go as she pleases.” She folded her hands over her pink tweed jacket, that glint of amusement returning to her eye. “Not that I want to put Lattimer and Bering or anyone else out of a job. Keep me informed of her comings and goings?”

Artie turned his attention to the computer, opening a new document. “Would you like that as a spreadsheet, debrief, or—” But he turned back around and, true to fashion, Mrs. Frederic had disappeared.

“Helena,” said Myka through kisses, “you didn’t finish the story.” Undeterred, Helena pressed her into the closed door.

“Can’t it wait?” she murmured lazily against Myka’s neck. She had bundled her bushy mane to one side, a plane of skin exposed on the other. Helena’s teeth grazed just over Myka’s jugular, and Myka bit back a gasp. She kissed her way back to Myka’s mouth, they way she knew would distract, and she could feel Myka melt under her, a sudden-and-somehow-gradual lack of resistance, until Myka caught her by the sternum with one hand and pushed back.

She held Helena at arm’s length. “Not if you want me focused,” said Myka, an eyebrow raised, though her cheeks were flushed. Her eyes strayed to the nightstand, where the newly framed photograph rested on the book no one could read. Helena’s mood had improved since the Doctor’s departure; perhaps due to the gift, perhaps due to the reduction in pressure to behave, or maybe it was regaining her friendship. Or else it was her restoration to the status of cleverest in the room in the Doctor’s absence, not that Myka would have told her.

“Right, take care, H.G.,” the Doctor had said, with what she appeared to intend as the quickest awkward hug. Helena held her for a moment longer than anticipated, and the Doctor made uncomfortable eye contact with Myka as her arms dropped to her sides before she was released.

“And you, Doctor,” said Helena. “Wherever you might go. _Whenever,”_ she added.

“Ah, you know me. Always on the move. We’ll be alright.” She lingered in the TARDIS doorway. “Might have to restock supplies for custard creams now that Pete’s been in,” she muttered. “Good luck, you lot. Myka, you've the most sense here, take care of Helena for me, will you? No errant time travel while I’m away?”

“You bet,” said Myka with a nod. She looped her arm through Helena’s, ignoring the way Helena pretended to glare at her.

“You can reach the TARDIS wherever we are now, too,” added the Doctor. “Might’ve hacked into the ‘unhackable’ Farnsworth frequency, gave it a little flair. Give us a buzz if you find anything unusual, yeah? Well.” She shrugged. “More unusual than you see day to day.” She turned back to Helena, her eyes sparkling. And without another word, she sidled into the TARDIS. Myka and Helena stepped back as the wind kicked up around them with that signature rush and wheeze, and the TARDIS flickered away.

Myka looked at Helena pointedly, never one to miss an ending. She liked being able to close a book she’d just finished and slide it back into place on the shelf with a satisfied breath and the shuffle and thunk that well-used bookshelves made; this much Helena knew.

She heaved a sigh as she took Myka’s hand, and they crossed the room to sit on the end of the bed. “If you insist.”

_Caturanga straightened his spectacles as he laid the letter on the desk, regarding the newcomers with amusement. A lean woman in black wearing a veil, another, slightly scrappier woman on her arm, and a rather potato-like fellow with a broad pate balder than his own stood before him expectantly. Helena hovered to one side, fidgeting with the hem of her waistcoat._

_There was a long silence until the potato man spoke, bobbing in place: “The Doctor explained all to us and we agreed to the terms and conditions. We will capture many artifacts, for the glory of Sontar.” The woman without the veil elbowed him. “And, er, this establishment.”_

_“Strax is right,” said the veiled woman, whom Caturanga surmised was in charge of the other two. “The Doctor is a very old, dear friend of ours, and she simply cannot be here at all times, as magnificent as her abilities are. So we’re hereby requesting employment at Warehouse Twelve, effective immediately. I hope she’s laid out our qualifications?”_

_“Not in the slightest,” said Caturanga, leaning forward on his elbows. The veiled woman and the woman without the veil turned to each other in slight dismay. “She mentioned you were friends, and that was all. However, since you are here, who am I to turn away eager apprentices? After all, you seem to have taken excellent care of Agent Wells, and none of you seem perturbed by the unknown, which I find are excellent qualities in prospective agents. And the Doctor’s singular quality speaks for itself; any friend of hers is welcome here.” He gave them the smallest smile. “If you’ll excuse me, Agent Wells and I need to have a chat. I’ll have Agent MacShane show you around, if you don’t mind waiting here a moment…?” He tilted his head as he offered his hand to the woman in the veil._

_“Vastra,” she said, taking it. “And my companions are Jenny Flint and Strax. I do hope you’ll find us more than up to the task. Our specialties will be great assets to you and we are very hard workers. A lot of experience with the unknown.” Through the veil, Caturanga spotted a guarded smile that matched his own._

_“Excellent. Allow me to give you your first formal welcome to Warehouse Twelve.” They let go, and Jenny beamed as he kissed her hand next. Strax nearly crushed his fingers and, masking his wince as another smile, he beckoned Helena with his undamaged hand. “Agent Wells, if you would accompany me on a stroll among the stacks?”_

_“Of course,” said Helena, tentatively following. Caturanga had a gift of carrying silence that was neither comfortable nor uncomfortable, as each one of his steps lacked the clipped nature of irritation, nor were they languid with grief. It was simply that: the neutral air of disappointment, and it hung heavy around Helena’s neck. They had made it three sections deep into the Warehouse in silence before Caturanga next spoke._

_“It’s a true shame, losing a field agent, Helena,” he said softly. “And Wolcott showed such promise.”_

_“He was a fine partner,” she said, the corners of her mouth pulling down. Her stomach turned. “A good friend.”_

_“Good friends are hard to come by these days,” Caturanga murmured, resting his forearm against a shelf, the artifacts on it quiet and benign as though they matched his mood. With his free hand, he pushed up his spectacles and wiped his eyes. They were still shining when he looked at her next. “And now I hear you’ve requested internment in the Bronze Sector.”_

_“I would have preferred that to remain private with the regents, but I expect there was no way for that,” said Helena, fingering her locket chain._

_“The Doctor didn’t explain much about his death,” said Caturanga. “Rather a short letter that explained only pieces, but gets around in the end. Very like her.” His eyes traveled over the rim of his spectacles. “Though she did say not to judge you too harshly. We all know the measure and weight of grief at some point in our lives. And here I find you’ve judged yourself harshest of all.”_

_“We are hardest on ourselves.” She tried to force her mouth into an upward curve, but all it did was flatten. “The regents were unanimous in their assent. Removing me from the Warehouse wasn’t a solution; you know I’m clever enough to get back in one way or another. I’m a danger to myself and others, and I proved that not long ago. This is a way forward for me. I could wake up in another time, a better one. You’ll get on without me, I’m sure of it.”_

_“Helena,” he said, taking her hand in both of his. “I’m begging you: rethink this. The new recruits will do well, I’m sure, but none of them is you. You could take some time off; recuperate in the country. Come back when you’ve recovered.” Helena gently cupped her free hand over his as Caturanga shook his head. “I’ve changed the rules for you more than once; I’d do it again and again. You have such_ potential _, I’ll not see it wasted.”_

_“You’ll have to,” she whispered, her eyes wet. “For the good of the Warehouse and everyone, everything in it. I’ll take my potential into the future, maybe emerge better.” She stepped back. “The regents have given me a day’s grace to get everything else in order. Time for one more chess match, I daresay. And no doubt, you’ll thrash me as always.”_

_Caturanga managed a watery smile. “You know, I was getting tired of losing. One more game it is, and maybe this time the tea will be perfect.”_

Claudia scooted into the dining room, an old letter clutched in hand. Without a word, she tossed it on the table, the heavy parchment slapping down. Pete looked up from his cereal, mouth full, and Myka, Steve, and Helena also startled from their respective coffee, tea, and food. They all looked at her expectantly.

“It’s been quiet without Team TARDIS,” Claudia began. “Not that we needed them in the first place, but I kind of miss the sound of British accents.”

“You just miss being able to manufacture Tesla-zookas at a thought,” said Pete, crunching. He swallowed. “And if you wanna hear a British accent, H.G.’s still here.” He pointed with his spoon, and Helena arched an eyebrow back at him.

“You miss the spaceship, too, man,” retorted Claudia. “Let’s face it, that was the most fun we’ve had, like, _ever_. And we just found out aliens exist, probably. One just taught me how to code in Sontaran and Judoonese.” She crossed her arms. “I’d like to see Sykes get past my firewall now,” she said with satisfaction. “Ten languages tangled up together, no one except the Doctor and I have the decryption, or the capacity _to_ decrypt it.”

“Getting a bit beyond us normies, huh, Claud?” said Steve. He took a slow sip of coffee. Claudia sneered playfully back.

“So I went digging in the Warehouse Twelve archives. The regents were right, there’s a small, mostly redacted file on the Doctor. Nothing crazy in there, just says she was an apprentice, which tracks with H.G.'s story. They must not have scraped the bottom of the cabinet, because Caturanga’s files were… a little disorganized.” She shot a sideways glance at Helena, whose face betrayed a faint fondness.

“Genius is often difficult to understand to the outsider,” she said cryptically, and she, too, took a slow sip of tea. “I promise, he had a method.”

“Ignoring the suggestion that I’m not a genius and moving right along,” said Claudia, “I found the letter in the bottom of the drawer, still in good shape, too, given it’s a hundred some odd years old. Care to enlighten us, H.G.?” All attention at the table turned to the envelope, its yellowed flap weighed down by a cracked blue wax seal, a vaguely familiar pattern of rectangles imprinted on it, though several fragments of the wax had fallen off over time.

Helena took the letter, and, opening it, began to read.

_Caturanga,_

_Sorry to dash like this, but I think I’ve lingered too long at Warehouse Twelve. Thought I’d take a moment to say thanks, I haven’t had that much fun at chess since my brain was at stake against an army of Cybermen, but there you are. If you’re reading this letter now, my friends will have delivered it to you with H.G. Wells in tow. Precious cargo, you know. In my absence, they’ll make awesome agents. I’ll let them speak for themselves. Just don’t let Strax find the weapons stash; he’ll start hoarding them for Sontar and the artifacts will clash and you’ll have a right old mess. Keep an eye on them for me, will you?_

_There’s been something of an accident. I am sorry. Wolly was just trying to help, as was his way, and, well… Don’t be too harsh with Helena, she’ll take this hard, and she was already grieving._

_I wanted to let you know, the perfect cup of tea’s out there somewhere, probably waiting for you to make it. You and I, we like puzzles and figuring them out and you’re right; the perfect cuppa’s just about as puzzling as you can get. I’ve had a whole universe’s variety of teas in my lifetimes and I must admit yours was nearly there. Takes a lot to impress me, well done._

_Don’t wait around for me, all right? When I first heard about Warehouse Twelve, I thought “right, another bit of Earth for me to take care of,” but I have no doubt that I’m leaving it in some of the most capable human hands I’ve seen in a century. Or so. Give or take a decade._

_All to say, Earth’s protected from artifacts, so thanks for handling that. You and whoever else follows. I’ll miss you._

_Kisses,_

_—The Doctor_

_P.S. Still not sure if I like signing off with “kisses,” do you think it suits me? I’m a Time Lord, not French._

“Kind of puts a whole new spin on what we do, doesn’t it?” asked Claudia as Helena finished.

“Question, what are ‘Cybermen’?” asked Pete, his cereal soggy and forgotten.

“Haven’t the foggiest, and I don’t think I want to,” said Helena. She smiled to herself as she folded the letter.

“She wasn’t serious when she said centuries, was she?” asked Myka, incredulous.

“Mykes, she just showed me how to code in alien,” said Claudia. “You’re still doubting she’s one of them?”

“No, I guess I was expecting aliens to be… different.”

“She’s got two hearts, if that answers anything.”

“That… raises more questions,” said Steve, frowning at Helena.

“I expect we’ll be able to ask her another time,” she said. Her mug empty, Helena rose from the table. “Speed dial to the box and all?”

“Emergencies only,” warned Myka, kissing her cheek. “If she’s really protecting the whole universe, it makes what we do seem… small. Like you said, she was basically playing with Dark Vault artifacts.”

“She did what, now?” barked Artie, arriving with coffee and a croissant, his other arm loaded with case files. He set them on the table. “You know what, I don’t even want to know. Sit down, we’ve got work to do.”

Life at the Warehouse had never been dull, but as she took her seat beside Myka again and Artie started dealing cases like cards, Helena thought the wonder had never once been more endless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading all of this fic. I've said before I've been sitting on this crossover for ten years, and I meant it. How satisfying, then, to complete a multi-chapter within two weeks of starting. If you've made it this far, well done. Thanks for dealing with my nerdy prattle, it's what we're all here on Ao3 for, no?
> 
> I've decided that there are JUST enough neat loose ends--not frayed ends, mind--that I could throw a one shot here and there on some further Warehouse/Doctor antics, like the fam encountering a whammy, or what the Doctor taught Claudia how to do when they were palling around on maintenance and Gooery cleaning. Or Jenny, Vastra, and Strax as Warehouse 12 agents, which I must say I had a blast getting around to. The wonder is indeed, endless, as these two universes were ALREADY veritable sandboxes; putting them together is like a whole beach of possibility. So I've put this work in the series "Warehouse Thirteenth," and I hope to fill it out at some point in the near future. In the meantime, I'll hop back into pure Whovian fics (see also, One Shots, Blue Box if you haven't!) and I'll see you very soon!
> 
> As always, remember to be kind to yourselves and others, wash your hands, stay safe, and smash any buttons you like. I love reading your comments and giving behind the scenes on my writing process therein, so feel free!
> 
> And thanks again for reading this crossover. It's been a journey.
> 
> Best,  
> Jo


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